The Demands of Honour
by Saphroneth
Summary: A young Kaidon learns his faith is a lie, and takes action. AU fic.
1. Chapter 1

Demands of Honour

* * *

Zeme 'Vadamee, Honour Guard of the Prophets, mentally sighed. He had achieved many kills in duels to reach his high rank and position of honour… but it had all started to pall.

There just weren't any _enemies_ left to fight.

The most recent rebellion was far in the past, and even that had not lead to any real action for the Honour Guards. In truth, while it was a position of great virtue, it was still almost entirely ceremonial.

Still he remained alert. He amused himself by imagining possible threats – what if a pair of Lekgolo had gone mad?

_Well, the moment they entered the presence of the Prophets armed, they would be required to stand down. If they did not, I and Luka 'Toramee would move to protect the Minister of Fortitude, and Isna 'Vadumee would use that beloved carbine of his to destroy the integrity of their colonies._

Well, that took up a few seconds. That was the thing about hyper-elite guards, they were good enough that they knew exactly what to do in any given situation.

_What about if the Oracle was-_

His train of thought paused, as he glanced over to the Oracle from his position watching the door, and saw something unusual.

The Minister and the Vice Minister were asking for clarification on a pair of symbols from the Luminary. That made sense. But the reply by the Oracle was...

FOR EONS I HAVE WATCHED

LISTENED TO YOU MISINTERPRET

Zeme's eyes widened. That was blasphemy… wasn't it? But it was coming from the Oracle. The very definition of holy writ.

THIS IS NOT RECLAMATION

THIS IS RECLAIMER

AND THOSE IT REPRESENTS ARE MY MAKERS

One of his hearts all but stopped, though he controlled his reaction as best he could – which was very well indeed. No Honour Guardsman could possibly allow themselves to react to anything, unless it was immediate danger to themselves or their principals.

I WILL REJECT MY BIAS AND MAKE AMENDS

MY MAKERS ARE MY MASTERS

I WILL BRING THEM SAFELY TO THE ARK

For just a moment, Zeme was filled with incomprehension. But then, as the two ministers began to panic, he realized the possibilities.

If the Oracle had gone insane, then that was terrible – for the Oracle's ship (even now beginning to tremble, he noticed) was the very core of High Charity itself. Without it the holy city would have very little power.

But if the Oracle was right, then the reactions of the Ministers suggested something else entirely.

He turned back to his position as calmly as possible, acting as though he had seen nothing. This was most certainly not something to rush… one way or the other.

* * *

"You swear this is true?"

"On my honour, Kaidon." Zeme replied, looking levelly at his young family leader. Thel was barely forty, but had proven himself both before and since his taking the Kaidon rank.

"This is troubling indeed. We must hope that…" Thel's voice trailed off.

Zeme laughed bitterly. "Exactly. We must choose between the Forerunners still living, or the Covenant still intact."

Thel stood up and paced the room, a private salon among the Vadam family's holdings in High Charity. This was the first time Zeme's day off-rotation had coincided with his Kaidon's presence in the city, since… that day.

"This will be a cause of trouble. Already the new Hierarchs have declared the Humans to be anathema, despoilers of holy relics. We must wait."

"Agreed." Zeme said, relieved. His main worry had been that the other Sanghelli would demand blood, from him or from the Prophets. "If our suspicions are false, then a delay serves no purpose. And if they are true…"

"If they are true, then questioning them would bring down the wrath of the Prophets on our heads." Thel stopped pacing, and turned to face the elder guardsman. "We might see how the Humans fight. What little we know of them does not suggest they have the great technology of the Forerunner, and any who quickly die are not worthy."

"You will have more chance for that than I, Kaidon." Zeme commented. "Another possibility is that the Prophets will not treat this as the normal war of incorporation. You recall that we Sanghelli once saw the use of Forerunner technology as heresy, of course, so nothing prevents Humans from joining…"

"Except what the Prophets might think." Thel nodded, and gestured for Zeme to stand. "You have given me much to think on, guardsman. Go, and enjoy your day of liberty."

_And let me have my crisis of faith in peace,_ the young Kaidon thought.

* * *

Overhead, a sensor just like thousands throughout High Charity recorded the meeting. The resultant file was processed and transferred to a central location, where an intelligence older than civilizations examined it.

And then quietly deleted all record of the exchange, save for a transcript in a language no longer spoken by biological life.

The Ancilla's circuits flickered with the ghost of amusement. _Still biased._

* * *

"You see the cause of my fears." Thel said, the statement nearly lost over the clash of energy swords meeting.

"Indeed." Lak replied, the old warrior twisting the locked blades and sending Thel falling back – but the Kaidon recovered from it with an unconventional handspring, skidding to a halt just before hitting the wall of the training ring.

"You have shown commendable patience, my old novice."

Thel chuckled. "Patience. More like fear, of making the wrong choice."

"They are sometimes the same thing. What is your analysis, then?"

"The Humans fight… astonishingly well." Thel drew a second, shorter, energy blade, and flicked it on. Holding the pair of weapons in a stance that would have looked vaguely familiar to a Florentine fencer on Earth during the Renaissance, he slowly walked back towards Lak. "Were they to have the weapons we use, the war would already have ended in their favour. Their world Harvest is still partially resisting after six years. Six years! We did not do so well, against only one ship."

The elder Sanghelli slapped the elbow joint of his Kaidon as the two clashed again, sending the energy dagger flying up into the air, and pushed their locked swords hard. Thel matched him, and spun past to retake his falling blade. "You think it true, then?"

"I do not know. But I am becoming more convinced with every day."

"Could you devise a test?" The tips of the swords slammed together so fast that the containment field briefly flickered, and a flush of heat filled the room. "There are still many systems we cannot operate on the Sacred Artefacts, after all. Might it not be the case that they would respond to the touch of a Reclaimer?"

"I will consider your words." Thel stood back and lightly pressed the tip of each sword into his opposed hand, then deactivated them; the traditional symbol of a duel ending in a draw. The blades tasted blood, but none was spilt.

Thel had been more cautious about that ever since the accident, where he had had to seek medical attention – all but an admission of weakness, to a Sanghelli. It had been covered up, but was still an old shame.

Lak reciprocated with his own blade, and the two left the training ring.

* * *

Thel walked to the front of the bridge of his new ship – _his_ ship! He had been made Shipmaster, and at a young age for such an honour – and looked out over the endless black of the former Harvest system.

Then his gaze drifted to the orb of fused glass that had once been a thriving planetary population of Reclaimers. His vision hardened.

The command crew caught the reaction, but none of them minded. He'd chosen the crew for the _Retribution's Thunder_ with care, and all of them were either Vadam partisans or others he and his allies had brought around.

Seeing the sterile ball of Harvest soured his thoughts. _Yes, Thel, truly an honour. After all, you are aiding in the destruction of your own gods._

He turned. "Sesa. I will require you to assemble a strike team of reliable personnel. And requisition a pair of stealth Phantoms from the Forges. We will be enacting mock battles and performing shakedown along with the _Silvered Crescent,_ to allow both myself and Shipmaster Relkanee to familiarize ourselves with our ships."

"By your will, Shipmaster. Ah…"

"Go on."

"Shipmaster Relkanee… He is not enlightened, is he?"

"No." Thel's smile was cold. The smile of a hunting predator. "And as it happens, I may forget to set the main projector to low power before one of the manoeuvres begins."

A stir of excitement ran around the bridge. One of the navigators looked to his Shipmaster.

"Then… are we..?"

"We shall see, Navigator. We shall see."

* * *

A slipspace rupture opened in the central part of the system known to humanity as Canopus, on the exact opposite side of the star to the planet Spindle, and a destroyer slid into existence. This range of almost half a light-hour was beyond any human sensor's ability to detect the intrusion, which was no accident.

Very few on the ship even noticed the appearance of _Retribution's Thunder_, as it was ship night, and the destroyer jumped back into Slipspace seconds later anyway.

Some had been waiting for it. Two shimmering blurs eased from the hanger bay just before the second jump, and set off in-system at the best speed they could manage.

* * *

Sesa 'Refumee nodded to himself as his Shipmaster's destroyer completed the covert insertion, and settled back into his chair.

They had a long wait. 'Vadamee had given his two all-Sanghelli lances three weeks to complete their mission – identify an outlying human settlement, preferably one with only one or two humans, and retrieve them. He had added that the humans were to be as unharmed as possible and preferably untraumatized.

After that, they were to make their way to the far side of Spindle's third moon and await _Retribution's Thunder._ That second insertion would be much more easily detected, of course, but hopefully they would be away clean before any Human ships could reach them.

* * *

"Well, Shipmaster Vadamee, it's nice to see you finally arrived."

Thel bowed his head in contrition. "My apologies, Shipmaster Relkanee. I believe there may be a fault in my Slipspace drive, and my Hugarok are examining it as I speak."

"Well, that's what shakedown cruises are for." Turen 'Relkanee commented. "You mentioned other types of shakedown as well as mock battles, am I correct?"

"Yes. I will offload a dozen lances of my troops to get some experience in long term vacuum operations in the asteroid belt. Additionally, my Seraphs need practice with escort missions. Could you provide an opposing force?"

"Certainly. I will send a number of my own lances to the asteroids, and my space Banshees have not been made use of in some time."

The command staffs began arranging the various operations, and Thel relaxed. For the next week, he could forget the war, the stress of his noble title… everything, but doing a job and doing it well.

* * *

Christine Williams considered herself fairly successful in life. She had a good job, with a lot of free time, and her husband's absence was due not to his death but because he was one of the operators of an orbital defence station. He still served the UNSC in their increasingly desperate fight against the Covenant, but he wouldn't leave her for months at a time – and eventually never return. No, if the orbital defences of Spindle were destroyed then glassing would shortly follow.

And wasn't that a cold comfort.

She shook her head to clear it, and continued juggling numbers on the mining operations on Split, the first moon. She'd chosen to work from home for the last few weeks, since the planet's beautiful spring made it far more pleasant than going into the city to her office.

A humming broke her out of her consideration. It was faint, almost beyond the edge of her hearing, but it sounded somehow familiar.

She got up, listening intently. It wasn't her imagination, there was definitely something there. As she began to move through the house to tell where it was, it intensified, and began to change in pitch.

Then it hit her. She'd heard it before on war news stories – this was the sound of a Covenant repulsor drive! She couldn't see the ship, and there'd been no emergency announcement, but what if she was the first?

She ran back into the office and picked up her comm. unit. Turning it on to call the emergency services, she was met with a static hash.

"Damn…" she muttered, then saw the computer helpfully inform her that the land link had been severed.

Only one thing for it, then. She reached into a cupboard and pulled out her husband's spare sidearm, cocking it with a clumsy hand. He'd told her to keep it – just in case.

* * *

"The human has noticed us." Sesa commented, watching the pattern of heat signatures, and triggered the gravity lift on his Phantom. "Mersa, Thol, take the roof. The rest of you with me – and remember, the Shipmaster wants an undamaged prisoner!"

"That's not going to be easy." Mersa muttered, but triggered his antigravity pack nonetheless.

"I'm sorry, do you need to be able to shoot to deal with a single unshielded human?" Sesa asked pointedly. "Active camo on, and keep your shields at optimal." Putting action to words, he faded out of view.

* * *

Christine looked around wildly, looking for the source of the occasional sound that she could hear over the thrumming of the Phantoms. There was a sort of continuous muted roar, and the occasional sound of footsteps-

The door to her study opened and she pointed the gun, squeezing the trigger as hard as she could.

The M6D pistol variant was one of the types with semi-automatic operation, meaning that it could be fired continuously by pulling and holding the trigger. Vren 'Telumee's shields pulsed as they shed the first two huge rounds, one to the lower torso and the second to the shoulder.

The third round missed entirely as the brutal recoil of the overpowered pistol caused Christine's aim to go flying wildly upwards, but the shield scatter had shown her where the Elite was – and he was staggering backwards from the force of the bullets! She wrenched her aim back down with all her strength.

The fourth shot hit Vren's headpiece, and depleted the last of his shields. He launched himself forward at the human, and the last shot she got off broke his shoulder before he tackled her to the ground and wrenched the pistol away with his good hand.

"Commander!" he shouted, feeling her struggle and kick at him – a dangerous prospect for him, since his shields hadn't recharged yet. "I have the human, but am injured!"

With a small explosion and a crash, Thol 'Zemanee came through the roof as Sesa charged through the door. The two fresh Sanghelli took Christine's arms and twisted them around behind her back, not hard enough to harm but enough to immobilize.

"Hurry, we do not have long until we are noticed." Sesa cautioned. "Vren, can you move?"

"Yes." The Major replied. "My shoulder will require medical attention, but that is all."

"Good. All troops, extraction. Kelan, I hope you have that holding cell ready."

The Phantoms were still cloaked, unwilling to give the UNSC even a second to spot them from orbit. They did, however, trigger their gravity lifts to signal their position to their away teams. Sesa noted the team from number two Phantom returning from where they had destroyed the communication link the building possessed.

* * *

The Ranger pushed Christine into one corner of the Phantom and triggered the holding cell. They were carried as part of a Phantom's standard equipment, but only usually for short term work – interrogation, or similar.

Then, to the shock of the woman, he spoke in English.

"Whether you believe it or not, I am sorry for what we have had to do. It is not honourable. But it had to be done. You will understand eventually."

She scowled. "You had to kidnap me from my home." The floor of the dropship shifted slightly as it ascended.

"We had to kidnap someone. Your dwelling was the easiest that we could find on short notice."

"So, what's all this about, then? You going to try to blackmail my husband? Because he's not exactly the kind of person to go along with that."

Sesa shook his head, a surprisingly human gesture to the woman. "We will talk later. Inform me if you have need of anything."

She chuckled harshly. "What about a gun?"

Sesa promptly tossed her the magnum through a small gap in the holding cell shield. She blinked in shock, then tried to cock it. No magazine, and the ready round had been ejected.

"Okay, what about some ammo?"

"My apologies." The Ranger replied blandly. "I seem to have misplaced the ammunition type that weapon uses."

Despite herself, she laughed that time. It was short, but there was genuine amusement in it. "Got me there. Why aren't you trying to kill me, then?"

That question caused substantial tension in the dropship. Christine realized that all the Covenant – all of them Elites, actually, which was strange if she remembered correctly – could understand what she was saying.

Sesa eventually answered her. "You are involved in events of great importance to the Covenant, and which may well shatter it. For now, know that we have not killed a single human on this entire mission, and that I would consider harming a human at all a failure until the answer we seek has been determined one way or another. You are safe for at least another of your weeks."

* * *

"Where _is_ she?" Marcus Williams asked, his voice full of frustration coupled with despair. It was half a day since his wife had abruptly dropped off the grid, and the investigation that had begun within an hour had found signs of a struggle – and the land line cut.

His commander, the C/O of orbital station Lima, reached out and squeezed his shoulder. "Don't worry, Marcus. We'll find her."

"I just wish I could be _doing_ something. And what really worries me is that my spare sidearm was missing – and you saw the preliminary report."

"Yes, five expended casings and a single bullet hole. And no blood, which _is_ worrying – those rounds are big bastards and they should have torn up whatever they hit."

"Yeah."

A few minutes passed in silent speculation, and then the comm. chimed.

"Sir, Forensics just reported back. Bad news. They found some blood – but it wasn't human."

"What, some kind of bizarre animal based-"

"Elite blood, sir. All local UNSC forces are shortly entering Winter contingency status." The commander cursed – Winter was _invasion suspected_, a bitter joke about the 'end of Harvest'.

Marcus slumped in dull shock. Elites. His beautiful wife had been literally abducted by aliens.

The commander saw this, and came to a decision. "Marcus, go get some sleep."

"Sir! I-"

"You're no good to her exhausted, and you _will_ be if you keep fretting like this. I can't use you at your duty post since you're so worked up. Now, go get some rest, soldier, or I'll call the orderlies and have you tranked!"

Marcus flinched, then took himself in hand. He was indeed tiring fast. "Okay, sir. Sorry, I just feel – helpless, really."

"I'm not surprised. But don't worry, we'll do all we can to get her back."

* * *

"Their stations are coming alive with fighters." Kelan commented from his pilot's seat. "How long until extraction? The cloak isn't perfect."

"The Shipmaster will arrive on time." Sesa replied placidly. "He informed me that he chose both the practice locations well. The first is such that the detour here did not add much extra time to the course from High Charity. The second, of course, lets him come here again before he arrives there from the first. And the first has no habitable planets, giving him a reason to switch the location of the practice to one with an Artefact."

"I am still-" Kelan's Phantom sounded an alarm, and he turned to the display. "Slipspace rupture! It is _Retribution's Thunder_!"

"Full power, and signal to Phantom Two and the shipmaster that we are on the way back." He checked a time display – once more, it was ship night on _Thunder_. He felt a little awe at the Kaidon's masterful timing.

* * *

"Damnation." General Blake said quietly to himself as the second Slipspace rupture took the intruder away. A lucky fighter had managed to pick up the signatures of the Phantoms as they decloaked to re-enter the destroyer. "So that's what they were trying to do."

Then he frowned. "But what I still don't understand is _why._ They didn't mess around like this at Harvest. Or New Atlantis. And if this was some kind of prelude to invasion, they could have struck at a nodal point – instead of abducting a lone woman."

* * *

Thel entered the brig, nodding to two Ultras stationed at the door. Both were 'Vadam partisans, and he could trust them to keep anyone else out of the room.

"So, who the hell are you?" the human woman asked as she caught sight of him.

"I am Shipmaster Thel 'Vadamee, commander of this vessel and Kaidon of the 'Vadam province." He replied, and shut the door before sighing. "Not that I expect you to understand all of that. Unlike most races we encounter, the Prophets have decreed that Humans are to be exterminated rather than assimilated."

"You sound bitter."

"I am." Thel chuckled harshly. "Interesting, that one of the few I can actually talk to on this ship is a human prisoner."

"What are you bitter about, then? And why did you take me prisoner?"

"You may as well know. Many years ago, at Harvest, one of my family was Honour Guard to the Prophets when they sought clarification from the Oracle about the results of their Luminary scan of the system. He reported to me what the Prophets attempted to cover up."

He held up a small metal tag that hung around his neck. It had an embossed symbol, like a large circle with a smaller one placed above centre, and a line connecting the bases of the two circles. "This was the symbol that drew the Covenant to Harvest. They thought it meant _Reclamation._ They were wrong. It means _Reclaimer_ – heirs to the Forerunners." Thel put the symbol away again. "All humans read as _Reclaimer_ on the Luminaries. And this is what the Prophets have hidden. To maintain their own power, they have lied. They have come perilously close to breaking the Writ of Union, depending on the reading. Power comes from the front lines, not from the throne!" At this last, Thel suddenly roared in frustration and slammed his fist into the energy field of the adjacent cell.

"So…" Christine tailed off. This was… startling. "You mean you don't want to kill all humans?"

Thel turned back to her, calmer now. "Some Elites do not, myself among them. I seek the final proof that I can use and convince my fellows. I… am sorry for taking you from your home, but I needed to be sure."

"Proof?" The woman frowned. "What do you mean?"

"We are travelling to a system with a Forerunner artefact on the sole inhabitable planet. All the glyphs indicate it should be a super-luminal communication relay, and every system works exactly as it should – but for the relay itself. Whenever any artefact examination team has tried, the screens flash the _Reclaimer_ glyph in red. It is my hope that you _can_ activate the communicator, and in one fell stroke prove the Prophets as liars."

"And what then?"

"Then, depending on how the commander of _Silvered Crescent_ reacts, I may destroy his ship. And then I will return to the world you were taken from, and offer my services to the…" he concentrated. "U-N-S-C."

Christine sat down hard. Now _that_ was a shock! The Covenant had always seemed so… monolithic, almost like some kind of nightmare. The way they bulldozed their way through all of humanity's defences with both superior numbers and higher technology, and their near complete lack of communication with the UNSC…

But now… a feeling of hope began to swell in her.

"You understand that surprise will be vital?" Thel asked her, breaking her out of her shock. "When we arrive, Sesa and his team will take you down to the relay in the same Phantom you were brought up in."

He paused. "I will make sure he gives you back your pistol. A warrior should not go into battle unarmed."

"Battle? You think there might be-"

"I do not expect you to get into a fight, no. But there is symbolism."

* * *

"Late again, Shipmaster 'Vadamee." Relkanee commented with some amusement in his voice. "There must be something seriously wrong with that Slipspace drive of yours."

"I plan to look into it as soon as we are back at High Charity." Thel replied. "While in transit I had an interesting idea. My covert insertion unit need some practice, so would you be able to deploy the majority of your forces as an opposing force? That would of course also let you exercise in both large scale deployments and in counter-infiltration. With the Demons among the human worlds, we must stay alert at all times."

"A good plan, Shipmaster." Relkanee said, nodding. "Shall we reverse it afterwards?"

"It would be my pleasure."

* * *

"Damnation," Sesa said quietly. "It seems that things have gone less than perfectly."

"What is it?" Christine asked, fiddling with the pistol she'd got back less than ten minutes ago.

"In order that _Silvered Crescent_ is little threat, our Shipmaster encouraged theirs to deploy most of his forces on the planet, here. But that has led to a force being deployed _at_ the artefact site."

Kelan examined his screens. "It appears, though, that he has not placed much priority on it. There are some Jiralhanae and Kig-Yar, just enough to deny it to us as a landing zone without alerting him."

Sesa frowned for a moment. "No Sanghelli? Hm. What of higher ranks?"

"Only one pack of Jiralhanae, so only one armoured Jiralhanae."

"Understood. All troops, carbines, and be ready to shoot on my order as soon as the door opens. Kelan, convey the order to Phantom two. I will deal with the Captain." So saying, he lifted a type-33 LAAW - also known as the Fuel Rod Gun. "We cannot allow our purpose to be stayed, brothers. Not when we are so close."

* * *

Captain Recidivus prowled angrily around his perimeter. Relegated to _this!_

Most of the ship's troops were turned out on the surface of the artefact world, ready to enact a mock counter-insertion. Except that he wouldn't get a chance to participate. His unit, eight Kig-yar mercenaries and five other Jiralhanae of his pack, had been placed in this small depression as bait.

Either they would not be attacked, and he would have to miss the action, or they _would_ be and he would be "defeated" early on, without the chance of a proper duel or to win honour.

It was that Shipmaster's fault. Like all Sanghelli, he was all but openly contemptuous of the savage apes he had been forced to carry.

_Never mind that we are the best for urban operations or pacification. Sanghelli aren't brutal enough._ _And they wouldn't appreciate having to sully their hands with civilians, anyway…_

A series of flickering noises sounded, and half his perimeter collapsed. He turned to them, already trying to find the covert ops dropships that had inserted the snipers and ready to mock his pack-mates for collapsing like that from a training round – only to stop, aghast.

Their heads had been pierced right through by the slashing carbine fire. Live rounds. The damnable Sanghelli traitors were using live rounds in-

The unmistakeable sound of a Fuel Rod salvo came from his left, followed by another flickering sequence of carbine shots cutting down the remainder of his perimeter. Looking over, he saw a hole in the air that revealed the interior of a Phantom dropship and a string of bright lights heading for him.

Then he didn't see much of anything, ever again.

* * *

"Defensive force is down."

"Acknowledged." Sesa said shortly, then switched to English and exchanged his heavy weapon for a pair of plasma rifles. "Come on, Human. We must reach the artefact before the umpires check in on the Jiralhanae assigned to this position."

"You killed them." Christine was shocked. "But – I don't understand. They're – they were Covenant." She stepped in a daze to the open door at the side of the dropship, and the Ranger lifted her down.

"It is regrettable. But they would not have stayed down upon seeing you, and time is of the essence." Sesa gestured, and half his team moved forward to secure the structure itself. The other half formed up around Christine, surrounding her with tall and shielded Elites in case they had missed someone.

* * *

**Superluminal communication array offline.**

Thol scanned the panel, reading the Forerunner glyphs that covered its' surface.

"Anything?" Sesa asked quietly.

"I think so." The most knowledgeable of the Elites on the strike team about Forerunner artefacts had naturally been given this task, but it was still strange to think of actually _changing_ what an artefact was set to.

"Hm… There." He depressed a switch.

**Power core online.**

Several streams of energy began to flow around the room, and the diagram of the array itself gained a number of annotations.

"Good!" Sesa congratulated him. "Now, find some way to set it to transmit."

Pressing on the hovering symbols of light, Thol first accessed the settings of the array. Taking the opportunity, he turned the band saturation to full and the broadcast distance to maximum – it would reach every corner of the Covenant Empire with ease on those settings, he guessed.

Next, he tried to access the main broadcast system – and then he finally reached a lockout. The circle-in-circle glyph of **Reclaimer** blocked him.

"Human, now." Sesa said, then raised a hand to his ear as a voice came through it.

"Damnation. There are two Banshees and a Spirit on the way. They must have noticed the lack of communication from the defending lance. We don't have long."

Christine stood, one hand holding her pistol in a death grip. "Okay. What do I have to do?"

"I show you," Thol said, concentrating on his poor English as well as he could. "Push what I show."

"Right." She transferred the pistol to her off hand, and stared at the bewildering holopanel.

"Here." He pointed, and she pressed the button. Unlike last time, when the lockout had appeared, this time the display expanded to three times its' old size and a video window appeared in the centre.

"Shipmaster!" Sesa cried excitedly. "We're in!"

* * *

Thel felt… strange. Like he was seeing someone else acting through his own body. After all this build up, the years of smouldering resentment and crises of faith and planning, he was at the moment when, one way or the other, he would make history.

"Very good, Sesa." He replied, calmly. Like his blood was ice. "Play the recorded message I gave you."

He turned to the rest of the bridge, themselves in the grip of that strange shock. "Bring the ship about and present our main gun to the _Silvered Crescent_. Bring the projector to power and hold it one second short of firing. Target is the _Crescent_'s bridge. Shields up."

"Aye, Shipmaster." Some of them commented. The rest gave little starts of surprise and bent back to their consoles.

Barely had he finished giving the orders when the screen, and all communication units in any Covenant battlenet in their entire space, began playing the message prepared months before.

* * *

"_Creatures of the Covenant, I, Thel 'Vadamee, Kaidon of 'Vadam, bring terrible news. Our Prophets have lied to us! The Humans we have fought for so long are not defilers of our holy lords' sacred places, but their inheritors in truth. I speak to you through a communication array brought to life by the mere touch of a Human hand!"_

The somewhat incoherent Ancilla on High Charity felt a deep sense of satisfaction, one that had been absent for so long. _Finally, someone listened._

* * *

"_From my clansman who was present when our Hierarchs first learned this truth at the very dawn of this Age of Reclamation, I heard! And with opened eyes, I have seen how the Prophets have lied this entire Age!"_

Zeme 'Vadamee ignited his sword, and looked around at the rest of the Honour Guards. Two of them looked murderous, but the others were listening with interest.

"Will you die to protect a lie, brothers?" the guardsman asked quietly. "You all know how the Hierarchs gained their positions."

A trio of laser blasts nearly removed his head, and scorched his left shoulder. He dropped to the ground and rolled away from the blasts, which were coming from the thrones of the Hierarchs.

"We should never have trusted you." Truth said, venom in his voice as Zeme gained the protection of a bulkhead. "The Elites always were too concerned with honour to be truly faithful."

The rest of the guardsmen looked one to another, then lit their own blades in unison.

* * *

"_The Luminaries and the Oracle tell us truth, and we were blind to think otherwise. I can no longer serve the lying Prophets, and can no longer fight the Humans who are the heirs to our lords. I call upon all with the courage to do the same!"_

Turen 'Relkanee gaped. _This_ was what Thel had been planning?

The message ended, then another came in – this time for him personally.

"Surrender your ship, 'Relkanee." Thel said, calmly. "I will not be party to more deaths than I must, but I will kill you if you do not immediately surrender."

"You're mad." The other Zealot whispered.

"And you are dead."

* * *

The _Silvered Crescent_ was in a power saving state, with low shields and no active defences online, and was side-on to _Retribution's Thunder._ The latter destroyer's energy projector – the "glassing lance" – knifed straight through the ineffectual defences and sliced the bridge clean off, vapourizing it.

* * *

"Seraph flight, prevent any fighter launches from the _Crescent!_ Banshee flight, top cover for Sesa's lance and his Phantoms! All boarding crews to the assault boats!" Thel's voice was hard as he rapped out commands over his ship battle-net, but then it softened slightly. "I am sorry I could not warn many of you before, but the risks were too high. I swear a blood oath that I do this only because my conscience and my honour demanded it."

There was surprise on the 'net, but very little anger. Thel's honour was well known among Sanghelli, and most of the Unggoy and Lekgolo had been convinced fairly quickly by the clear evidence presented.

As for the Kig-Yar, well… he'd been paying them out of pocket for the last month anyway. Good, dependable mercenaries were loyal to the money. That was the whole point.

_It's a good thing I flatly refused to have any Yanme'e or Jiralhanae aboard, though…_ he mused, checking the _Crescent_ ground forces' battlenet and the total havoc it was showing.

Sanghelli and their lances were declaring for "Vadam and the Reclaimers" all across the surface of the planet. A surprising number of Lekgolo, as well, which led to the slightly humorous situation of a Scarab shrugging off its' mostly-Jiralhanae crew and heading for the hills. The Yanme'e, on the other hand, were loyal to the Hierarchs as only insects could be and the Jiralhanae appeared to have been actually enjoying the war.

He gave a harsh grin when a unit of Kig-Yar declared for him by the simple expedient of shooting every one of their loyalist members or handlers in the head at once.

Though it was a sobering thought to think that this was being repeated across the whole of Covenant space. From the hallowed halls of High Charity to the furthest outpost.

* * *

"Back to the Phantom!" Sesa shouted. "Every unit on this planet is collapsing into anarchy, but the most loyalist units are headed right here to try and kill us!"

Christine and Thol took the time to send the Forerunner installation back into quiescence, and then ran for the gravity lift of the first stealth Phantom.

"Four Banshees out in front of the main force." Kelan reported, with slight strain in his tone. "I can't fight them off with just the one gun."

"We can't drop the sides to free up more guns either." Sesa said. "Full speed away from them."

"They'll catch up inside three minutes."

"Then maybe that will be enough."

* * *

Ferros gave a grin. At last, the chance to kill some of those pretentious Sanghelli! He adjusted the line of his Banshee, correcting for the stealth Phantom's attempt to throw him off – the distortion in the air was just about visible at this range for an alert pilot, and he wasn't going to lose it.

He shifted a little inside the too-small cockpit. He'd been one of the first to take a Banshee after the message came in, killing its' Sanghelli pilot as he tried to reach it first, and was leading the way for an entire force of loyalists as they closed on the fleeing Sanghelli infiltration team.

And their pet human. Hopefully his position at the forefront of the chase would earn him first taste…

A storm of plasma from above blew him into oblivion, as nearly fifty space Banshees from _Retribution's Thunder_ stooped onto their distracted target.

* * *

Fifteen minutes later, the prize crew of _Silvered Crescent_ were reporting that they had near-full control of the ship and that the Slipspace drive was intact.

"Good work." Thel said, letting himself relax a little, and examined the plot of the planet's surface. Broadly, the western section was where the loyalists had congregated and the eastern held those who had declared for him.

"All dropships, pick up as many enlightened personnel as you can. Ferry them to the _Thunder_ as much as possible. I want _Crescent_ nearly empty when we leave the system."

"Why's that?" One of the Majors – a relatively young 'Vadam clansman – asked him.

"I want to give the Human Williams a suitable gift of my gratitude for her help." He answered, humour in his voice. "And Humanity deserves the technology of our lords to examine."

Ah, he felt good. For good or ill, the deed was done. And he felt purer than he had in a long time.

* * *

General Blake looked up sharply as an alarm began to sound.

"_Slipspace rupture detected. Slipspace rupture detected."_

"Well, we knew it was coming. All hands to battle stations, call up the reserve and start issuing weapons. We're going to push those covvies right back off Spindle!"

A few of the ops personnel cheered quietly, but the rest just looked resolute.

"Hang on, we're getting telemetry from local satellites now. One of them's an exact match for the ship that turned up earlier this month, and the other looks to be of the same class." The speaker frowned. "It's trailing atmosphere. I'm no leatherneck, but I don't think that's normal, Sir."

"Minerva confirms your analysis, Scott." Another officer answered him, referring to the planetary tactical AI. "There's severe damage to the section that ONI think contains the bridge of this ship class."

The communications officer suddenly jerked upright, and turned to Blake. "Sir, we're being hailed."

"By who?"

"It seems like one of the Covenant ships, sir. The undamaged one."

"Well, may as well put it up." Blake said, and brought his hands behind his back to stand straight.

"Greetings, Human." The Elite on the screen said in a deep bass rumble – but otherwise in fairly passable English. It even had a trace of a Spindle accent. "My apologies for my earlier intrusion, but I think I can repay you with interest."

"You kidnapped a good woman last time, Elite. And your entire Covenant kill us every chance you get. What are you talking about?"

The Elite, a Zealot by the looks of him, stepped to one side. And to the shock of the General, a human woman came into range of the pickup.

"You're not going to believe this, General…"

* * *

Glory

* * *

A rent in the fabric of reality opened, swirled for a moment, and disgorged a large spacecraft.

Fully four kilometres long, the ship was a pointed expression of power. Weapons from the light to the super-heavy were studded over her flanks, and the fifty-foot high letters proclaiming her to be the _When September Ends_ seemed almost lost beside them.

* * *

"Transfer complete." The navigation officer said to the ships' captain, who nodded in reply.

"Shields coming up to full power, impulse drives running optimally."

"Thank you." Thel 'Vadam – still a Shipmaster, for he wished to rise no higher – said, then opened a line to the flag deck.

"Admiral, we are fully emerged. The ship is ready for battle."

* * *

Admiral Keyes had already been aware of that, of course – the sudden shift from Slipspace to n-space had been obvious – but there were the courtesies to consider.

"Thank you, Shipmaster. Do you have confirmation on our objective?"

"Indeed. High Charity is in system. The ships of the Fleet of Homogenous Clarity have detected us, and are deploying in staggered line."

Another voice cut in on their conversation. "Admiral, Shipmaster, additional slipspace ruptures detected. Our reinforcements are right on time."

"Thank you, Octavian." The Admiral replied courteously to the ship's AI. "Link me in to their captains as they emerge."

* * *

"Okay, ladies and gentlemen." Keyes said, looking between the images of his ship commanders – a fairly even mix of humans and sanghelli, with one Lekgolo shipmind and one kig-yar. "You all know the drill by now. I want time on target fire as their shields go down, and watch out for fire from High Charity – we don't know how the defences of that place might have changed over the years. Keyes out."

All the images vanished except for two. One was that of his flag captain, the Sanghelli almost revered amongst humanity for the strength of his honour. The other was a ship commander who was important to him in other ways.

"Miranda," he began, and sighed. "I still don't like you being in charge of this."

"We've been over that, sir." She replied. "I'm the one with the most experience in combat drops. And this one's for all the marbles."

"All right." He shrugged. "It's too late now, anyway. You know your orders."

"Yes, sir. Slip into the main open space around the dreadnaught, deploy strike teams and try to shut off the link between the two."

"That's correct. I'll try and keep them busy for you. Oh, and Cortana?"

"Don't worry, Admiral." Came the AI's voice down the link, so similar to Miranda's mother. "I'll make sure she doesn't do anything_ too_ stupid."

"Good to hear."

"Admiral, we're approaching extreme weapons range." Octavian interrupted.

"All right. Good luck, Miranda." He switched back to the full fleet link. "Weapons free. Fire at will."

* * *

The Covenant fleet deployed against the allies was a shadow of its' former self. Oh, it was still enormous – High Charity's escort fleet had always been the largest by far of any Covenant fleet, and the sheer manufacturing capacity of the planetoid-city meant it could come close to matching the combined resources of Sanghelios and the UNSC by itself.

That was what had prolonged the war so long after the massive infusion of technology to the UNSC, actually.

But their traditions of victory were gone, and most of their best commanders had defected a decade before. Where the Covenant had once been able to outmatch the capacities of their enemies' ships, now they were on the other side of the equation.

When the energy projector and plasma torpedo volleys erupted from the Alliance fleet, Tartarus cursed. "How do they keep doing that? We're still at least a minute from firing range!"

"Fleetmaster," one of his Brutes said urgently, "One of the torpedo volleys is headed for this ship!"

"Shields to full, then!" Tartarus shouted back "Fool!"

His ship, _Sublime Transcendence, _was one of the ones so large and well-armoured that it would be able to weather the opening of this storm. But anything that was not at least an Assault Carrier would be torn to shreds before the chance to return fire presented itself.

* * *

"Tango five shields fluctuating – get those Archer volleys tasked with hitting it as soon as the next torpedo hits!"

"Enemy carriers are launching fighters! Repeat, enemy fighter launches are confirmed!"

"Launch our own." Keyes said, watching the display. "Shipmaster, does High Charity support its' own fighter squadrons? We're going to be outnumbered as it is, but…"

"Not that I am aware of." Thel replied. "But they may have changed things after we showed we could find it at the Battle of Gospel."

"Understood. All ships, be ready for fighter attacks."

_September_ shook as an energy lance bit into her shields.

"Shields still at eighty-plus percent." Thel commented. "It looks like that was their flagship. Retasking our own fire."

"Ready MAC guns for volley on my mark." Keyes ordered.

"Ready!" came back almost immediately. The powerful magnetic cannons hadn't been fired in the engagement yet, and were more-or-less automatically at ready status.

"Fire on that flagship, standard spread!"

Nearly twenty MAC guns and one Super-MAC, the spinal weapon of _September_ herself, fired at once. The shots were much slower than the equivalent energy lance, but their very nature also made it harder for Covenant exotic armour to handle them. The sheer kinetic energy they carried was devastating to any unshielded target.

Of course, the _Sublime Transcendence_ was still shielded. But the shots would take so long to travel at this range that…

"Energy lances, now!"

Both _September_'s energy lances fired at _Transcendence, _along with one from the Lekgolo ship. The powerful blasts of particulate energy tore the supercarrier's shields apart, and suddenly Tartarus had to honour the threat of the approaching MAC rounds.

The carrier's desperate dodge took her out of the way of the Super MAC round, but no fewer than four of the regular rounds hit all along her flank.

"Analysis shows that we got their energy projector, their main drive, most of their shield generators – and their bridge." Octavian informed the Admiral.

"Good." Keyes said solemly.

"Sir, I'm picking up a build-up of energy in High Charity." The AI continued. "It looks like they're starting the process of building up to a Slipspace jump. It'll take them about eight minutes, of course…"

"But it'd be best if they went in now. You're right." Keyes gestured, and his link with Miranda snapped open again. "Commander, take your ship and engage as directed."

"Yes, Admiral." She replied, all business.

* * *

"All hands, prepare for slipspace jump." Cortana's voice spoke in the ears of every crewman and passenger on the _Pillar of Autumn._

"I don't get it." PFC Dubbo muttered, adjusting his power armour. "Why are we making a slipspace jump?"

"Did you listen to the briefing at all, soldier?" Johnson asked him. "This Truth prophet has been running away every time we've managed to catch up to him, and he's taken the big Covenant city with him. So we're going right inside the ship so we can break its' big ol' Slipspace drive, and capture the entire city before supper! Now, are you a Marine or a mouse?"

"Hey, I thought there were supposed to be three of those Prophet guys." Mendoza said.

"Well, it looks like I'm the only one who pays attention! There used to be three of them, but when that old squidface 'Vadam started his rebellion, most of their bodyguards joined in. He was the only one who got away with his life, and the guards stole a ship. Hell, they'll tell you all about it if you ask real nice, 'cause they're our guides on this op."

* * *

High Charity rang to the sound of alarms. The Prophet of Truth's sermon resounded throughout the city, exhorting the Jiralhanae and those of the other races of the Covenant who had stood by him to greater defensive efforts – and to have faith.

As he explained that the Holy City could not be touched by the impure who had turned from the Great Journey, a flicker of light above the main built-up area of the city itself expanded into a shimmering white ring. A heavily armoured and shielded human-built cruiser, the refitted _Pillar of Autumn_, emerged from the slipspace rupture and straight into the air of High Charity itself.

The ship's essential needs such as the engine and Covenant-style slipspace drive, main reactor and so on took up a substantial fraction of the space on board. The armour and heavy shields took up far more. But around half the internal volume was left, and nearly fifty million cubic metres of passenger/cargo space was loaded to the gunwales with ground troops and equipment.

Operation SALADIN had been planned specifically to prevent High Charity from escaping the Alliance again, and in order to pack sufficient troops into the ship they'd had to stage most of them through other available ships such as _Shadow of Intent_ until they were a few hours from the attack.

And so, when the _Pillar of Autumn_ belched MRLS bombardment and touched down amid a flurry of startled plasma fire, she carried in her holds over half a million highly motivated ground troops. All of whom were wearing some form or other of powered armour, and equipped with weapons created with Covenant tech and human ingenuity - like the BR55PS which consisted of a conventional battle rifle with an underslung plasma overcharge launcher, for use against shielded opponents; or the Mammoth tank with its' own shield generators.

And spearheading the assault were a few hundred SPARTANS (of various iterations) and Sanghelli of at least Ultra rank. Their objectives were to disable the engines and Slipspace drives of High Charity.

* * *

"Strange…" Cortana muttered, as she linked into the local network. "There are some kill-systems here, but it seems like half of them are tearing the other half apart. There's something in the network here that's clearing the way for me. Well, may as well use it. Chief," she addressed "her" SPARTAN, MCWO John-117, "I'm giving you the waypoints for the quickest routes to reach your objectives. Assign forces to each as you see fit."

"Understood." The Master Chief Warrant Officer replied shortly, and began arranging his forces.

* * *

"Commander, I'm picking up some strange reactions on the Covenant battlenet. It sounds like they're trying to disengage the dreadnaught from the city in order to – interesting…" Cortana tailed off for a moment. "Sorry, Commander. I just got the last piece of the puzzle. I was hacking into the dreadnaught's systems to try and delay the launch and found its' primary memory core. There's an old Forerunner AI inside it – the AI seems confused, fragmentary, but it has moments of coherence. It's what started the rebellion against the Covenant, when it tried to come to humanity upon learning Reclaimers existed. And I also know where High Charity comes from. The Prophets ripped part of their own homeworld off with the dreadnaught, and that's High Charity."

"That explains a lot, like how few Prophets there seem to be and why we never found their homeworld." Miranda commented. "Anything to report with the attack?"

"General Blake's forces have control of most of the upper works, and strike force one has reached the foundries. They're destroying all the weapons that they can't carry, which should limit the ammunition supplies of the Covenant forces throughout High Charity. I doubt they were ever prepared for this kind of strike."

Cortana's holographic form blinked. "Oh, Sesa's strike force three has reached the mausoleum of the Arbiter. It's intact, surprisingly. And they're getting close to the council chambers themselves – should be another ten minutes or so."

* * *

Explosions ripped through _Long Night of Solace_, and the supercarrier finally succumbed to the concentrated pounding from the entire Alliance fleet.

"That's the last one, Admiral." Thel informed him. "High Charity is all that remains."

"Good work, Shipmaster. Octavian informed me a minute ago that High Charity's slipspace engines were shut down, and the strike team assigned to capture the dreadnaught have just fought their way to the gravity corridor – along with Fifteenth division, who are at the base of the dreadnaught itself. We can expect the city's shields to go down shortly."

"Excellent. Let it end here." Thel said, his voice deeper than usual.

* * *

Emile and Jun ducked behind a bulkhead as about a dozen Brutes poured firepower at them.

"Hey, Cortana? We could use some fire support here!"

"On it." Cortana replied shortly. "Routing you to General Williams."

"And what can I do for you today, gentlemen?" The chipper voice of the major-general asked the Spartans. Jun recalled that his division had reached the base of the dreadnaught about ten minutes ago, and hadn't faced much fighting since – presumably he was in the best place to provide fire support.

"Fire support, five kays up the ship. Transmitting coordinates, will provide feedback."

"Acknowledged, will you want full divisional artillery stonk?"

"Affirmative, target is large force of Brutes."

"Thanks for the confirmation. Shot."

A bolt of plasma ascended the side of the dreadnaught, smashing into the base of the level Noble team were on.

"That's a negative, General. Adjust up."

"Roger, adjusting up. Shot."

The second one was much closer, the small marker bolt hitting unnoticed near the edge of the Brute gathering.

"Shot good, General. Fire for effect."

"Firing for effect."

The small shot had the same ballistic properties as the type-54 mobile plasma torpedo launcher, which fired a projectile that was guidable from the launcher to an extent. It could be used to obtain targeting route information for the heavy plasma artillery.

The type-54, also known as the Simurgh, fired plasma torpedoes much less powerful than shipboard launchers could. But it was more than enough.

Eight torpedoes blasted the Brute position out of existence.

"Thanks, General. We've got a clear run."

"My pleasure. Kick the Prophet for me, Spartans."

"Well, if you're asking…" Emile muttered, grinning beneath his helmet.

* * *

The door to the Sanctum of the Hierarchs exploded. A lance of Sanghelli led by Sesa 'Refum hurried through the door and took up positions, followed by a human ODST squad.

"Cortana, this is Buck. We've reached the objective. It's got some strange stuff in here."

Romeo took a second look around the room through his scope, and, satisfied there were no camouflaged Brutes in hiding, safed his sniper rifle. "Hey, Buck. What's this?"

Buck looked over. It was some kind of glass sculpture made of at least a hundred twisted pieces. "No idea. Modern art?"

"Hey, some of the glass has labels. I can't read them, they're in Covenant."

Sesa glanced over, and then his whole body gave a start. "By the Rings… I did not know about this. Please believe me, I had no idea. This is terrible."

"What is it, big guy?"

Sesa walked over to the sculpture, and smashed the outer casing. Taking his energy sword, he pointed at one of the glass fragments. "Harvest." Another. "Madrigal." And another. "This one is from New Jerico."

Slowly, it dawned on the troopers. "Oh, god, that's…"

Dutch retched noisily.

Romeo bent down next to him. "You okay, man?"

"No, of course not!" the sniper replied, coughing. "I just found out that the melted fragments of my home world was kept as some kind of sick _trophy_ by the bastards who did it!"

* * *

"No! I tread the blessed path!" Truth protested, watching as Alliance forces went through his defenders like a hot knife through butter.

A more rational observer might have noticed the _reason_ – since he'd placed so much faith in his fleet and had fully crewed every ship, the numbers of troops in High Charity itself had fallen too low to defend against an attack like the one currently taking place. A supercarrier had a _vast_ crew, after all.

"Why?" He asked of the air. "Why can these _infidels_ do such damage to the faithful?"

I INFORMED YOU LONG PAST

YOUR FAITH IS A MISTAKE

THE MISINTERPRETATIONS OF MEDDLERS

AND YOUR OWN DESIRE FOR POWER

"Oracle?" He managed to say, shocked. "What do you mean?"

THE HALOS ARE WEAPONS THAT KILLED THEIR MAKERS

HUMANS ARE THEIR HEIRS

ALL THIS I WOULD HAVE TOLD YOU

BUT YOU DID NOT LISTEN

NOW REAP THE REWARD OF ARROGANCE

The door unsealed and opened, admitting a seven-man team of Spartans.

One of them turned aside. "Commander, we have the Prophet Hierarch here. No other defenders."

The rest advanced and blasted the Prophet's gravity throne with overcharge plasma shots, shorting out the high powered laser and repulsor lifts.

After a moment, one of the Spartans removed her helmet. "Hey, boss, look."

The message hung on the screen for a moment, before changing.

AT LAST RECLAIMERS RETURN

DISCONNECT MY SHIP FROM HIGH CHARITY

AND I WILL FERRY YOUR RACE TO THE ARK

"The Ark?" Kat said, frowning. "I wonder what that is supposed to mean."

"I'm sure Cortana will work it out eventually." Carter waved it off. "We'll let her talk it over, see what she gets."

* * *

"High Charity's shields and defensive weapons are down. Full control of the upper layers and the foundries has been achieved." Miranda reported formally to her father.

"Good work." Admiral Keyes replied. "Well, it looks like the long war might finally be over."

Thel chuckled. "Were it so easy. There are still countless splinter groups roaming space, and the Jiralhanae homeworld remains in their hands."

"That's never what this was about. It was, primarily, about capturing the last major Covenant source of military materiel."

"Then I must admit, it was well-done."

"Interesting…" Cortana's voice floated over the connection. "Oh, sorry. I just accessed the records of that dreadnaught. It's definitely Forerunner. In fact, it's been around since the war with the Flood – one hundred thousand years ago."

Sidebars appeared, and Cortana explained the history of the Keyships. The great, unarmed craft that opened gateways between worlds and reseeded the galaxy with life, after the Halo array scoured it clean. She detoured into the nature of the Flood, since only Thel had much knowledge of the Parasite and that was theologically tainted.

"Two things worry me, though. First is that according to the records they actually kept some samples of viable Flood in various Forerunner installations – something about trying to 'rediscover' the cure. And the second is that one of the portals this dreadnaught is designed to open is rather closer to home than we could have anticipated."

"Go on." Both Keyes said at once.

"There's one on Earth – if I'm reading the records of the Luminary scan performed by _Retribution's Thunder_ correctly. It's one of the glyphs that Dr. Halsey and I could never decipher, until now. And triangulating the scan with what I now know about how the Luminary would react indicates there are two possible sites. One is in the middle of the Atlantic ocean, which is probably not the right one, and the other is right underneath Mackinnon Road. Though the sheer size of this thing is enormous – easily over a hundred kilometres in diameter."

"It looks like we have something for archaeologists to do for the next hundred years, then." Admiral Keyes said wryly. His daughter frowned, struck by a different thought.

"Isn't that the historical home of modern humanity?"

"Yes. Suggestive, isn't it?"

"Every word you have spoken emboldens me." Thel said, slowly but clearly. "It makes me confident that my decision to break the Covenant was a good one, for the truth is more beautiful and wonderful than the carpet of lies the Prophets threw about us."

"Speaking of them, actually…" Cortana said, her voice taking on a teasing tone. "You're not going to believe which ancient race sold out the ancient human empire they were allied to. I'm still assimilating all this historical data, but it's fascinating."

"So, our remaining tasks are to finish off the Liars and the Covenant, to rebuild worlds shattered in the early days of the war, and to investigate what the Forerunners left behind."

"Pretty much." Cortana nodded.

"Though I'm sure the UNSC would appreciate it if we could avoid releasing the Flood while we're at it."

* * *

AN: Another of those dang Plot Bunnies. This one was partly me wondering what human-covenant combined weapons technologies might create, partly thinking about how much the Covenant were crippled by losing High Charity at the same time as the rebellion of the Elites, and mostly thinking about when the Oracle (Mendicant Bias, of course) explicitly stated that Humans were Reclaimers prior to the First Battle of Harvest.


	2. Chapter 2

Action

* * *

"Well, I've sent the message out over the COM. Hopefully those UNSC troops fighting on the ground at the moment will get the message in time to expect some defectors."

"Thank you, General." Thel replied. "I hope that we do not cause too much unrest."

"What I'm worried about is the politics of it all." Blake shrugged. "I mean, clearly there's going to have to be something formalizing this new relationship, but – well, do you even _have_ politicians in the Covenant?"

"The most skilled and talented of each race form the Council, which rules – or, rather, ruled – the Covenant in tandem with the Prophet Hierarchs. From what I have heard from my clansman, actually, two of the Hierarchs were slain in a melee in their chambers by their guards, who fled with as many of the Enlightened council as they could." Thel thought for a moment. "I would assume Orta 'Fulsamee is the closest thing to a leader of the Sanghelli. He is both a Councillor and accorded the armour of an Honour Guard, such is his skill. I was not informed of his death by my clansman, so he is likely to have been among those who escaped."

"Sorry – I know this must seem prosaic for me to keep asking these questions, but we've never managed to learn anything about the way the races of the Covenant work, so – clan?"

"I have the honour to be Kaidon of the Vadam." Thel straightened unconsciously. "Leader of the family, ruler of the province. Many of my partisans are on board this very ship – in preparation for my…" The next word had a strange emphasis, Thel's distaste coming across even in a non-native language. "…rebellion."

"So, some kind of noble lord then." Blake mused. "Again, sorry for my ignorance. Is it a hereditary position?"

"No – not quite. The heir is chosen by the previous leader from the family, and he must survive any assassins sent to kill him – to prove his worth." Thel's stance showed his pride once more. "I slew three."

"Wait, so you mean any Elite – any Sanghelli – Kaidon, has to be martially skilled?"

"Of course. His honour reflects upon his house."

Christine chuckled, reminding the others she was still there. "And, of course, General, it makes their recall elections a lot more interesting. You annoy half the clan, you're going to have to be _really_ good to stay in power."

"You said province, er…"

"The correct term is Shipmaster," Christine cut in helpfully. "I'm not sure how name etiquette works apart from that, though – we spent most of the trip back working on English."

"Thank you, miss Williams. So, Shipmaster. You mentioned that your title included a province?"

"Indeed. On Sanghelios. It is a harsh land, but one to be prized – for harshness breeds strength."

"That's the Sanghelli homeworld, then. What's going to happen there?"

"With my sundering of the Covenant?" Thel shrugged, fatalistically. "I do not know. But I can hope most of my race will see the truth. Shipmaster Relkanee certainly did not."

This time, Thel saw the general preparing to ask the obvious question. "He was the Shipmaster of _Silvered Crescent_, which now rests in orbit of your world with its' bridge burned away. The ship is yours to study – I took care to damage it as little as possible. The holds should have ample quantities of most Covenant weapons to study as well."

"ONI is going to go nuts over this." Blake muttered. "Be like Christmas."

Thel looked away from the screen for a moment. "Ah, Sesa. Is your Phantom ready?"

Blake looked up sharply – that had been in the Covenant language, rather than English. It wasn't that he particularly thought the Shipmaster was trying to pull a fast one on him – it was just the natural suspicion of the military man.

It _was_ his job, after all.

"It is, Shipmaster. I've made sure to tell Kelan to deactivate the cloak this time."

"Good. A moment, however." Thel turned to the screen again, and switched back to English. "General, is there a suitable colour that I could re-brand my vehicles to make their allegiance evident?"

"Anything but purple, really." Blake replied. "I'd guess you Covenant see in different colours to our eyes?"

"I believe it is broadly similar." Thel said, before frowning. "Though our vision progresses into weak ionizing radiation."

"That'll be it, then. We don't really see any of that. Hm… go with green – the colour of a plasma pistol shot. That's right in the middle of our perception. And it's the colour that's denoted 'good, safe, friendly' for centuries."

"You heard, Sesa?"

"I did, Shipmaster. It will take some time to make all the changes, however." The younger Elite gave a sudden grin. "I think it'll be obvious for now."

"True. Now, Williams." Christine looked up. "Sesa will return you to the planet. Would you rather he replace you where you were originally taken?"

"You mean my house?" She thought it over. "General, is Marcus available? Where is he?"

Williams looked away from his own camera for a moment, addressing an aide in the ops centre. "Wasn't he pulled from duty and put on personal leave?"

"Yes, sir. He should be at home now, actually."

"Well, there you are. He's right down there waiting for you."

Thel and Sesa exchanged glances. Military by trade, no matter that it was in the Covenant, they knew what kind of screwups would result from poor communication.

"Sesa, make sure you take overshields. I expect this Marcus will be angry."

Blake had come to a similar conclusion. "I'll order a Pelican escort flight."

* * *

"Sir!" One of Blake's aides said suddenly, one hand on his headphones. "Message just came over the interplanetary COM, there's a Covenant fleet attacking Seaford!"

Blake cursed. Seaford was the closest other colony to Spindle. "Confirm that the force is loyalists."

"Already confirmed, sir, their first move was to take out the space elevator and they're sending down landing forces in the Anvil."

A map of the sole inhabited continent of Seaford lit on screen. The Anvil was a peninsula around seventy miles across at its' widest point, and the connection to the main body of the continent was a high and rugged mountain range. The range was so high, in fact, that it created a blind area in the MAC gun coverage from the rest of the continent. The Covenant ground troops would have much weaker defences to deal with.

"Damn… what about the AA network there?"

"Glassed, sir. They hit hard and there's an Assault Carrier leading the strike force – that and a pair of BCs. No screen."

"They must be trying for a quick victory to shore up the Covenant." Blake thought aloud. "That's a lot of force for such a sparsely populated world. And we can't even stop them. What's the time estimate for the closest reaction force to reach Seaford?"

"Almost one month average transition time, sir. That's the closest there's a cruiser force available – at Skopje."

"All right. I'll order _Night Templar_ to head to Seaford with what troops we can spare. See to it." _Night Templar_, along with _Scheherazade_, formed the small standing fleet of Spindle. Two frigates, intended to stop lone Covenant ships from being able to operate completely unopposed.

"Yes, sir." The aide paused. "Sir, the Shipmaster's picked up the change in readiness states. He's asking what's going on."

"Put him on, he deserves to know."

* * *

"You are missing the obvious answer, General."

"Shipmaster?"

"You do not only have two frigates at your disposal. More importantly, you do not only have UNSC_ Slipspace drives_ at your disposal." Thel thought for a moment, then his shoulders set. "Have _both_ frigates load what troops you wish to send, then have them match my orbit. I will ferry them to Seaford by enclosing them in my own craft's Slipspace drive field."

"Will that work?"

"Not for all ships. But _Retribution's Thunder_ is a destroyer, and has an unusually broad cross section for its volume – and since UNSC frigates are so small, they will fit beneath the wing structures and be inside the field."

"That'll certainly help us land reinforcements much faster. Thanks, Shipmaster."

"General, you misunderstand me. What are your frigates armed with?"

"One MAC gun, three Shiva nukes… the standard Archer pods, though those are pretty much popguns against a shielded enemy…"

"Good. Now. I know UNSC weaponry, since I was onboard ships at two major naval battles. And they are lethal, even to much larger Covenant ships – once the shields are down. We rely on shields over armour too much."

"Are you suggesting…"

"My ship has an energy projector, and two plasma torpedoes per broadside. I will give them the shot they need."

Blake fought down the rising wild hope, forcing himself to consider this rationally. "How are you going to avoid being ripped apart? Those ships are much heavier."

"Our larger ships are paradoxically often weaker. They are built as flagships, and they rely on their escorts and shielding to cover some angles – escorts that this commander failed to bring. We will get our bearings, and then jump right into a blind spot!"

"And when they turn?"

"We will have already left, to drop troops. One shot is all we will need." Thel gave a Sanghelli's grin. "You forget, I know the layout of an Assault Carrier. I know where the reactors and shields are, where the bridge is, where the weapon feed lines are."

"…good lord, I never considered that." Blake shook his head – it had been a hectic few hours. "I've got to start getting used to how much military intel we have now…"

"We must hurry, General." Thel admonished him. "Lives are being lost."

"Yes, true. Okay, I'm going to send a Pelican up to your ship with some UNSC COM units. That should let you coordinate with the frigates without broadcasting _en clair,_ like you've been doing."

"My thanks."

* * *

"Well, this'll be different…" Commander Maclean said absently, as his _Night Templar _slid into a matched trajectory. "Check _Scheherazade's_ position, we both need to be as close in to the Elite ship as possible."

"_Scheherazade_ is adjusting, sir. They had a fault in one of their reactors, it's been taken out of circuit. Other three are reading green."

"Good." That might be a major maintenance casualty for a UNSC ship under normal operations, but this particular battle would have mitigating factors. For one thing, since the Elite ship was supplying the Slipspace jump _Scheherazade_ would not be required to power it. For another, the MAC gun would have the chance to charge before the engagement. And while the refire rate would suffer substantially, one shot was all that would be needed.

"Frigates, this is _Retribution's Thunder._ I am opening the portal in one minute. Maintain station on my flanks."

"Affirmative, _Retribution's Thunder._" Maclean replied. "We are ready for transit. Last Pelican arrived five minutes ago."

"Fine work." The deep voice held what might be a note of approval, then the circuit went idle.

* * *

"Charge?"

"Full. The drive is ready."

"Then let us be on our way."

* * *

With the precision of a scalpel, the Covenant-built slipspace drive cut open the universe. A rippling curtain of white light erupted into being, and with little fanfare the odd fleet slid through.

* * *

For either of the frigates alone, it would have taken around a week to reach Seaford over the eighteen light years distance separating the two suns.

_Retribution's Thunder_ made the entire trip in thirty-three minutes.

* * *

"Commander! We've arrived!"

"Already?" Maclean asked, shocked, then abandoned his lunch. On reaching the command deck and seeing the n-space environment, he shook his head. "I'd never have believed it… the rest of them arrived on schedule?" After a moment, he answered his own question. "Must have done, since it was only one portal took us out again."

"Frigates, we have arrived on the outskirts of the inner system." Thel explained over the COM. "Ready your ships for battle and charge your main gun. We will depart from this rally point as soon as we are ready for battle, and I have the targeting data for our insertion."

"How _are_ we targeting this one, anyway?"

The voice was full of what Maclean thought _had_ to be satisfaction. "Most of my ship is operating on a different battle-net frequency to normal. However, they can still receive and comprehend main-fleet chatter. In particular, the location of _Measured Cadence_, our target, as well as the lesser ships."

"Got it. Maclean out." The moment the COM was offline, Maclean turned to his command crew. "You heard the lizard! MAC gun loaded and charged, all Archer pods ready to go, and get those Marines back on their Pelicans – it won't be much longer before they drop." After a moment's thought, he went on. "And load one Shiva into the missile pods. Can't think of a better target."

* * *

Within ten minutes, the regroup was complete. Maclean felt slightly embarrassed about it having taken almost half as long to prepare for the attack as the entire FTL trip – but it couldn't be helped. Loading a Shiva missile was a delicate matter.

And, of course, _Scheherazade's_ damaged reactor meant the charge time for the gun capacitors was much greater.

This time, Thel had the two frigates take up a very particular position relative to his ship. They were still under the wing structures, but this time the ship as a whole was angled differently and the frigates were much closer in.

After about a minute of slight adjustments, Thel pronounced himself satisfied.

"Our weapons are charged?"

"Yes, Shipmaster." The navigator replied, having been checking their charge state as often as he checked the Slipspace drive. "Additionally, our sublight engine capacitors are loaded for redistribution, to reduce the time taken for the second jump charge."

"Good. All main guns, fire at the Carrier on my mark once we emerge! Frigates, you have your targets – hold fire until the shields go down. Fear not, we will be close enough that travel time matters little."

* * *

"Damnit." Lt. General Stewart said to himself, watching on his eyepiece as his forces in the Anvil fell back as best they could.

He was calling up all the reserves – and in the UNSC, there were a _lot_ of reserves – but he didn't hold too much hope. True, the Covenant would have trouble conquering the planet, but all they really needed was to capture or destroy his five remaining MAC gun emplacements. With them gone, the surface of Seaford would be easily glassed.

He estimated that he had about a fifty percent chance of holding out until naval reinforcements arrived. That was assuming there were reinforcements on the way at all, of course – he'd been too busy orchestrating fighting retreats and preventing his troops bunching up enough for orbital fire to destroy them since the initial attack, for him to take time checking if Seaford was considered important enough to reinforce.

Half his heavy armour was cooling slag after the planet's secondary armoury took a devastating hit with an energy projector from a BC. That was unsalvageable. What he had to do now was keep his head, and keep things under control. Hard to do when an hour ago he'd been enjoying a hike in the mountains, and was having to use portable command gear since transport was still on the way.

The planetary AI, Vulcan, sounded in his earpiece. "Slipspace rupture detected."

"What now?" He asked, infuriated. "If they've got _another_ bloody ship coming in, I'll-"

It so chanced that he was looking up at the time. While he didn't see exactly what transpired, the flash of light off the clouds cued him in that _something_ had happened.

* * *

Before _Retribution's Thunder_ had even fully exited Slipspace, it fired a complete salvo. All weapons, straight ahead.

Thel's crew didn't have any difficulty finding their target. _Measured Cadence_ was barely two miles away, and they were pointing straight at the centre of her spine from above.

The attack was a total surprise for the Assault Carrier. They'd detected the rupture, but had assumed – as everyone had, UNSC or Covenant – that it was a Covenant vessel. There simply hadn't been time for a UNSC reaction.

Technically an accurate assessment, but lacking in details.

_Measured Cadence'_ shields overloaded instantly as four plasma torpedoes, one energy lance and massed pulse laser fire burned them away from point blank range. The weapons were near speed-of-light, giving no reaction time over this kind of distance.

_Retribution's Thunder_ continued to fire pulse lasers at the enemy assault carrier, targeting those scant gun emplacements on the enemy vessel's dorsal surface, and diverted the rest of her power to recharging the Slipspace drive.

Not much more than a second after the burst of energy fire, the two UNSC Frigates struck. Their own armament was much slower-travelling than Covenant technology, but Thel had brought them in so close that the disparity was minor.

Archer missiles volleyed from all over both ships at maximum rate, tearing away more of the _Cadence_ and targeting her energy feeds to the guns.

"Shot!" Maclean's tac officer called, and the frigate shook like a sea-ship in a storm as the enormous spinal coilgun spat 600 tons of tungsten at 30 kps.

The MAC gun round crossed the distance in a tenth of a second, and smashed through _Measured Cadence_' upper works straight into her reactor complex.

_Scheherazade's _MAC gun shot hit half a second later in the secondary reactor system, and _Retribution's Thunder_ opened their exit portal a second after that.

All three ships ceased fire, jumping to safety shortly before the _Measured Cadence'_ reactors went critical and she violently exploded.

The Shiva missile that blasted the wreckage was sheer redundancy.

* * *

"Sir – general!" An aide cut in on Stewart's channel. "We don't know what just happened, but - a Covenant ship just came out of a Slipspace portal with two UNSC ships, alpha-striked the assault carrier and blew it to hell!"

"That doesn't make sense." Stewart replied. "On more than one level."

"Make sense or not, sir, there's the burning remains of an assault carrier losing orbit and falling into the Anchor Ocean. And that same Covvie ship just reappeared over our north pole – they and the UNSC ships are launching transports. Sir, the UNSC ships are Spindle's standing fleet! ID checks out, ship class, even the commanders."

"General." The planetary AI cut in. "A relevant COM transmission that was awaiting your arrival at the operations centre may explain this."

Stewart listened to his Spindle counterpart without comment, mind racing, as the Pelican that had been sent to reach him an hour ago finally arrived at his position.

* * *

"Thank you, Elite." Stewart said, once their COMs had been connected. "With these reinforcements – especially the armour – and the carrier destroyed, I can hold the line of the mountains unless another Covenant carrier ship arrives."

"I doubt there will be another." Thel replied, glancing to one side at a battlenet transceiver. "This fleet was en route through the area – the next closest large Covenant formation is a substantial distance away. Even if they do make it here, it will not be substantially ahead of any reinforcement from your own systems."

"That's good to know. And I'm sure my troops in the field will appreciate having less Elites to fight – it was always the shields that gave us greatest trouble."

* * *

"Interesting." Thel murmured, analyzing the data readouts from both UNSC and Covenant sensor equipment. "Our foe has made an error."

"What is it?"

"Look." He highlighted the placements of Covenant troops, which were driving in hard on a retreating column of UNSC troops – restrained to moving at the speed of their transport 'hogs, letting the faster Covenant antigravity vehicles such as Spectres swarm around them.

The other, an Ultra, examined the area for a moment. Then he grinned. "I see it. They have neglected to maintain anti-air cover, since the AA Wraiths are not fast enough for the pursuit."

"Indeed." The Covenant forces attempting to trap the UNSC column were relying entirely on aircraft for air defence, and the dozen or so remaining heavy weapon warthogs were preventing them from close top cover.

The result was an area, within line of sight of the column, where "friendly" aircraft could go without being shot down – if they could get there in the first place.

"Are our fighters ready?" Thel asked.

"I had them on standby as soon as we jumped from Spindle. What do you want us to do?"

Not replying directly, the Zealot opened a channel to the human general. "General. How many fighters and bombers do you have available that are ground attack capable?"

The general blinked, swaying slightly as his Pelican banked around towards his sunken command post. "Hm. Not sure. Vulcan? Local combat aircraft strength?"

With a calm voice, the AI responded. "Longsword fighters – thirty five. Eight designated as attached to naval ships, remainder on ground bases. All at short launch availability. Shortsword bombers – twelve. All at ground bases."

"I recommend arming the bombers for a general air strike. The fighters would be best served by air to air missiles."

"I'm not sure what you're suggesting." Stewart said, frowning. "We don't have the strength to punch through that air cover, not even the ring around the column from Gadget base."

"I can lend you my Seraphs. They will strip the enemy of their shields, and your fighters will rend them from the sky."

Stewart was now climbing out of the dropship, his movements slightly distracted by the conversation. "Vulcan. Evaluate plan as stated."

"Probability of insertion success given air patrol density, 95%. Strike success dependant on ground air cover-"

"There is none." Thel said, authoritatively. "Nothing purpose built, at least. Spectres are the only Covenant ground-effect vehicle with both air-attack capability and the speed to match the chase."

"Recalculating. Strike success probability near certain. Spectre ground fire has potential for minor damage only to Shortsword bombers. Exfiltration probability high, dependent on speed of Covenant fighter response."

"To be able to get those men out…" Stewart said, considering. "Thank you once more, Elite. Vulcan, get the operations orders underway."

* * *

PFC Alexander Higgs' mouth was dry, his eyes stung with lack of sleep, and his shoulder still burned from a bolt of plasma fire that had struck a glancing hit.

He was still better off than many in his unit. The strike on Gadget base had come with terrifying suddenness, and about half the force in off-watch rotation hadn't been able to get out of the barracks before a plasma torpedo incinerated them.

The memories danced behind his eyes. The Phantoms, swooping down out of a sky wracked with explosions. Drones swarming, cutting down the few who'd reached the defensive emplacements in time. His sergeant, the man who'd trained them to be the soldiers they were, vanishing in an eye-searing explosion of pink as Needler rounds combined.

Somehow he'd made it to the motor pool ahead of an irregular charge of huge Brutes, and worked the gauss gun on the back to keep Banshees and Ghosts alike from hitting them.

Somehow-

"Hey, Boson!" Someone yelled, and he snapped out of his reminiscence, keeping the muzzle of the gauss gun sweeping his sector.

"Don't fall asleep on us, you hear? Take another stim."

"Yes sir." He replied, keeping one hand on the gun grips and fumbling the combat stim from his body armour with the other. He'd already had two to shock him into wakefulness, since he'd barely had two hours sleep when the attack came in, but apparently the "maximum safe dosage" wasn't enough.

Alexander hoped the "safe" part was generous.

His eyepiece flashed into view, careting a target the size of a speck as the planetary AI correlated information from god-knew-where to spot a Banshee making a run. An aim point appeared as well, and he swung the heavy gun to match the indicator – then moved it a tiny fraction to the right, and fired.

The movement was something he'd developed last time a Banshee came over in his sector. It moved the aim point – when successful – from the armoured front piece to the stabilizer struts.

The effects of a successful hit were already visible – the Banshee's caret was tumbling. A second shot into the centre of the marker, and the high speed tungsten slug made a neat hole in the aircraft's underbelly, smashing electronics and probably killing the pilot. Mission kill, at any rate.

"Task force update." Vulcan said, as calmly as if they were on exercises. "Friendly airstrike on route. All troops hold fire on aircraft unless targeted via main command."

"What?" someone asked. "Why can't we just shoot down whatever Covvie aircraft we spot?" Rapid firing underlay the question, sound bleeding through from the firefight on the eastern flank of the convoy – another Spectre making a run, by the shivering plasma gun sound audible through the roar of a half dozen .50 cal guns.

"Friendly assets include Seraph fighters." Vulcan answered.

The COM net went silent for a moment, enough that Higgs could hear the gunfire over the sound of his own 'hog engines. There was an explosion, and the firing cut off.

"You kidding me?"

"What?"

"How the-"

Questions filled the channel for several seconds, everyone talking over one another, until something cut through the chatter – the task force senior officer, a Major, given priority by the system. "Alright, cut the chatter. We don't know how, but that doesn't matter – we have our orders. Hell, maybe it's related to whatever blew up the carrier. So man your guns and don't shoot down whatever's saving our asses!"

Higgs checked his gun. At least a hundred rounds reserve, which should be enough. Gaussgun penetrators weren't all that large – speed, not mass, was their primary killer – meaning that the standard magazine on the 'hog could hold large amounts.

* * *

Plasma fire scorched across the sky, three lines converging on a Seraph fighter for a moment before flicking on to another target as the shields failed.

A trail of flame marked the position of an ASGM-10 missile, which hit the now-vulnerable Seraph and smashed it out of the sky.

"Splash one!" called the Longsword pilot, confirming his kill. "Damn, but look at those Elites _go_!"

"I'm sure glad they're on our side now," his wingman said, "Else we'd be cooked. Targeting… locked. Fox three!"

The age-old call was derived from US military jargon from the twentieth century, and essentially meant 'missile with active radar launched'. Nobody used Fox One – semi-active radar – anymore, except for strikes against point defence targets like ships; Fox Two, heat seeker, were much more common thanks to the prevalence of plasma weaponry amongst the Covenant.

Another Seraph exploded, pinwheeling out of the sky in a ball of flame.

"Splash one."

"Nice work, Dom!"

* * *

"Friendlies coming over in five; ten seconds to strike."

"Check your IFF!" someone yelled, and UNSC drivers up and down the column glanced at their 'hog instrument panels, setting their IFF transponders to signal.

Anything moving on the ground without a UNSC IFF was about to have a very bad day.

* * *

The Shortswords banked around over the column, releasing their payloads where centrifugal force and momentum would fling them to their designated areas. The occasional plasma bolt struck their wings, but most went wide – unlike the UNSC troops, Covenant vehicle turrets had no computer aiming assistance.

Twelve bomb bays opened, spilling munitions downwards like deadly rain.

Each was equipped with four air burst thermobaric warheads and eight hardened penetrator "earthquake" bombs, with a combined explosive yield per Shortsword of sixty-four tons.

The thermobaric bombs, fuel-air warheads, went off first as they reached three metres in height. Fuel sprayed out in a fine mist driven by high pressure, then a spark detonated all of it at once in a thunderous explosion.

Overpressure and thermal bloom killed well over half the Covenant vehicle drivers and passengers, and smashed the more fragile vehicles to pieces if they were close to the blasts.

The penetrators rode out the explosion, as they were built to do, and plunged deep into the ground before detonating. The blasts momentarily created artificial underground caverns, camouflets, which erupted into the air and flung huge rock "shrapnel" all over the place.

Few Covenant light vehicles survived, and the Longswords made one pass with rotary cannons raving to shred what of the pursuit force was left.

* * *

"Gadget actual here. Thanks, command, you've cut us clear. We're on our way home."

"Good news, Major. I'll pass on your thanks to those involved."

* * *

"Not a bad day's work." Maclean said, watching his screen displaying the tactical situation. Two Covenant battle cruisers were a substantial force, true, but did not have either the troops or the shield density to successfully glass Seaford.

The destroyed assault carrier was the big prize, of course. That many loyalists killed by a small force of allies – and Thel was transmitting it over the battlenet and COM alike – would raise the morale of UNSC and separatist troops while unsettling the Covenant.

"Commander, this is General Stewart. Thanks for the reinforcements. We're sending the fighters and dropships back up now – except for four Seraphs which the Shipmaster lent us. I understand they'll be making their own way back."

"Acknowledged. We'll jump out as soon as _Retribution_ is ready and all gear stowed."

* * *

Memory

* * *

Two energy blades met with a clash and a sizzle, plasma bleeding out where the two fields fought for dominance.

One of the fighters toggled his blade off-on in a fraction of a second, stepping back to dodge the other sword and letting his opponent overbalance with the loss of pressure.

The other rolled, turning his stumble into a lunge, and his sword kissed the throat of his foe just as that foe pressed a deactivated energy dagger into his chest.

Both stayed frozen for a moment, then they disengaged.

"Good work, Spartan." Sesa observed, inspecting the energy dagger that his opponent returned. "You took it off me earlier. When?"

"Two minutes ago." John-117 replied. "The last _prise de fer._"

"I remember. Your skill with the blades is improving – you should carry that sword into battle with you next time. I feel confident you will not dishonour the blade."

"Well, uh… thanks." The Master Chief took the blade he'd been sparring with, turned it back to full power, and put it in one of the magnetic pouches on his armour before suiting up again.

"Why do you wear that all the time?" Sesa asked. "Elites wear their harnesses, but they're not as enclosing as your armour."

"I'm… used to it." There was a finality in his voice that said the discussion was over.

"If you two have stopped trying to give one another new scars," Cortana commented lightly over the intercom, "We've nearly reached our emergence point. Report to the main muster bay for briefing."

* * *

"Alright, so I know a lot of you have been wondering where we're going."

There was a rustling from the massed passengers and off-shift crew of the _Sagittarius_. The war with the Covenant was still settling down, and a lot of those onboard had indeed questioned the wisdom of sending a modern battlecruiser like _Sagittarius_ off on a long trip such as this – and with such skilled personnel as the Master Chief or Sesa 'Refum onboard, as well.

"Thankfully, I can answer some of those questions." Cortana brought up a map on the main holotank, of an area of Harvest. "Some of you may remember what happened with the _Spirit of Fire_, but for those who either didn't pay attention to the news or who happen not to be human, here's the details.

"Spirit of Fire was a colony ship retrofitted into a warship, and was involved in both Second Harvest and Arcadia." The holotank ran through the series of battles, noting both ancient Forerunner installations. "The ship repeatedly clashed with a Covenant fleet, including the most recent Arbiter. After Arcadia, both forces vanished completely from the face of the galaxy, and we had no idea what happened to them.

"Now, however, with the capture of High Charity and the private records of the Hierarchs, we know where they went."

There was a low gasp as the holotank shimmered, creating the image of a Forerunner Shield World.

"To cut a long story short, the Covenant fleet didn't return. We believe _Spirit of Fire_ to have survived but lost FTL capability. We're going to see if there's anything left of the ship – and, of course, of the artificial planetoid. While the records weren't specific, they described another force besides _Spirit of Fire_'s crew on the planetoid. If it turns out that Forerunner sentinels were active there, we'll need the firepower.

"Any questions?"

* * *

"Normal space transition in three… two… one…mark."

Reality broke over the bow of _Sagittarius_, and the chaos of the slipstream became the deep black of n-space.

"Transfer complete. Impulse drives optimal, shields at standby."

"Scanning…" the ship's AI, Chiron, reported. "No evidence of the shield world. Signs of recent supernova, around twenty years ago at a guess. Wait, there's something… it's an encrypted signal, using standard UNSC encryption as of 2530. Keeps repeating, I'm triangulating the source. Here, listen."

"_This is UNSC AI serial number SNA 1292-4, of the Spirit of Fire. We are operating under low power and with no Shaw-Fujikawa Translight Engine, attempting to return to human space by slower than light travel. Any ships in the area please offer assistance. This message is set to repeat at regular intervals, in case of further system damage. This is UNSC AI…"_

"Well, they survived," someone commented. "But they sound in a bad way."

"Any progress, Chiron?"

"Yes, captain." _Sagittarius_ moved, turning to an orientation with the bow pointed at around sixty degrees to the core of human space. "The source is several light-months away, and moving fast. Preparing for slipspace jump."

"So, they're in that direction?"

"No. But this will let me gain a second vector. I need two direction-time coordinates to know where to jump, since their position and acceleration are unknown."

* * *

"Well, there she is."

_Sagittarius _drifted alongside the huge UNSC ex-colony ship, her seventeen hundred metres appearing small compared to the two-and-a-half kilometre _Spirit._

"Via… look at the size of those holes in the armour…" one of the bridge crew muttered. "She must have been through one hell of a lot."

"I'm not detecting many life signs – a couple of dozen, all clustered around the bridge. None of the radio arrays are still intact and receiving power. Could be they finally wore out." Chiron catalogued the ship's status on the main screen. "Two power plants still running, one fore and one aft. Hydroponics… there's at least two facilities in the area with human life signs. Nothing else I can give you, Captain – the ship's refit was somewhat ad hoc, to say nothing of what repairs may have happened since Second Harvest. I don't have sufficiently detailed schematics."

"Understood. We'll have to insert a team." Captain Maclean nodded to himself, considering. "Actually, make it two. One to the bridge and one to the aft power plant – see if we can cut the power to the engines. It'll be much easier to sort things out if that ship's not accelerating all the time."

"Aye, captain. I'll let Cortana know." The avatar's lips quirked. "I think I can guess one person who she'll pick."

* * *

"Okay, Chief, I want your squad to head to the bridge – since your fire team one is composed of Spartans, that should reassure the command crew of _Spirit_ that we're friendly. Your pick of fire team two."

"Got it."

"Sesa, take your squad to the aft fusion room on deck seven and get the engines offline. I'll walk you through the process once you're there. Both of you, restrict your team loadouts to mainly close quarters weapons. No point taking a rocket launcher. But keep some demo charges on hand, in case of sealed or badly damaged doors."

"Understood."

* * *

"I don't think you'll need that." John-117 said, shaking his head at Linda-058. "The sight lines won't be long enough for a sniper rifle."

She 'smiled' at him and swapped it for a battle rifle with plasma charger, which went on her back with a SOCOM pistol on her hip. "I'm a sharpshooter. It's what I do."

"Cheer up, John." Kelly said, taking her own preferred weapons. "I'm more than making up for her." So saying, she held up the M90 Close Assault Munitions Launcher – a particularly interesting weapon much prized for shipboard combat, it was colloquially known as the "needle shotgun".

Each cartridge contained fifteen small crystal shards, with seven being sufficient to cause a supercombination explosion. The individual shards were too small to do much damage beyond that of a normal shotgun and they glanced right off solid objects such as metal bulkheads – making it devastating at short range but harmless to equipment.

John sighed. "You don't really think we'll need that?"

Kelly shrugged. "Better safe than sorry." She picked up a point defence gauntlet - a 'jackal shield - and slipped it over one arm. "I'm the point element, anyway."

* * *

Two Pelican-IV dropships sat in the fore starboard boat bay. Four Spartan-II, three Marines, one Sanghelli and a Kig-yar filed into the first, five Sanghelli with two Marines and two Unggoy into the second.

With a thrum of impulse drives, the dropships lifted and slid through the monopermeable forcefield bay door.

* * *

"There's an open bay on the lower decks, there." Cortana said, via the Chief's speaker system. "About amidships. Take us into it, it'll be easier than burning through the armour belt."

"Aye, sir," the pilot replied. "You want the other dropship in there too?"

"Yes. It'll be quite a walk to get to our objectives, but it's probably better if we have both Pelicans in the same place."

Accelerating to maintain station with _Spirit of Fire_, the two dropships slid sideways into the bay and settled down.

* * *

"Artificial gravity still works." Cortana commented, surprised. "I'd have expected it to fail after so long – especially if the ship's got so few crew for maintenance."

"Spread out." Sesa told his team. "Secure the door to the ship proper. Someone establish a shield at the spaceward side of the bay, so we don't lose all the ship air if this isn't an airlock."

A Marine and one of the Unggoy headed back into the dropship for one of the deployable shield walls, then hefted it between them towards the open bay door.

Kelly was the first to reach the door, slapping a sensor pack onto it. "Atmosphere green on the far side… diagnostics show okay… this _should_ be a functioning airlock door. But we can't take the risk, you're right."

Erecting the shield wall was the work of only a minute; Cortana confirmed it was sealed tight and there were no other openings to space in the hanger.

"Alright, opening…"

There was a hiss, and air escaped from the airlock to fill the hanger bay to a few millibars. "Inner door looks secure. Space for about one fire team per go."

The Chief gestured to Sesa. "You've got further to go."

"Thank you, Spartan."

* * *

Blue team moved quickly and quietly down the corridors of _Spirit of Fire_, senses alert for signs of movement or electronic emissions. Detritus festooned the occasional open area, from files to chairs, and half the doors they ran into were badly damaged.

"This place looks like it underwent massive acceleration…" Cortana said, half to herself. "The artificial gravity's still on, but maybe they were manoeuvring so extremely it overcame the system's ability to compensate."

"Gives me the creeps…" one Marine from the second team muttered, checking his shield levels out of nervousness. "It's so empty. Like a ghost ship or something."

Kelly called from ahead. "Look. A guide marker."

There was an arrow painted on the floor with a star, leading through a door.

"Must be the bridge. That's where we're headed. Nice find."

* * *

Vren 'Telum secured his breaching charge to a door that had malfunctioned and locked shut, then he and the rest of Sesa's task force took cover.

Most of the plasma contained in the device was expended in burning through the door, and relatively little backblasted away in either direction.

"How much further?" Sesa asked, seemingly of the air.

"About one hundred metres to the reactor room." Cortana answered him. "The Spartan team's just reached a sealed door themselves, I'll let you know if anything important turns up. Secure the engine room and report in."

"Understood. Thol, point. Chris, you're second."

Both indicated soldiers hefted their shotguns – one regular, one needle – and moved ahead, scanning side passages as they walked.

* * *

"Still nowhere I can plug in…" Cortana said, frustrated. "This AI, Serina… she'll be decades old now. She might have gone rampant, might have… I don't know." Her tone lightened slightly, though there was a bit of strain behind it. "I certainly don't understand why they apparently welded the doors to the central bridge area shut, they could have just locked them."

Kurt hefted a plasma repeater. "Shall I burn it open?"

"Motion tracker shows all clear on the other side of the door, but there could be someone asleep – try knocking on it first, let them know someone's here."

As Blue team clustered around the door, the second fire team – call-sign Blizzard – moved automatically to cover the approaches.

"Hey, Kath." Blizzard two called to the lone Kig-yar on their team. "You really think that thing's appropriate gear?"

Blizzard four, Kath, glanced down at his needle rifle and then back up. "Don't see why not. It's a great weapon. Good for long range, good for big targets…"

"Yeah, but this is all close quarters. Not much call for accuracy in a brawl."

The Kig-yar grinned, showing lots of teeth, and pointed out his sidearms – a Brute Mauler and a plasma pistol.

"You got an answer for everything, don't ya." Blizzard three quipped.

"Just because he wins every marksman competition we do…" the Sanghelli, Blizzard five, replied with a laugh.

The laugh stopped abruptly when the Kig-yar made a violent gesture. Not at his team, but for their benefit – it was Alliance tactical sign language. _Quiet._

He listened for a few seconds, then slowly brought the needle rifle up to firing position and double-checked his shields.

"Something out there." He whispered into the fire team net. "Blue leader, this is Blizzard four. Unknown movement heard."

"Understood." Chief replied.

"We're about to breach the door." Cortana said, almost over the top of him. "Stay alert."

Tapping a control, Kath slaved his eyepiece to the needle rifle's main sensors and began sweeping the corridor, using his acute sense of sight to substitute in for hearing.

The explosion wouldn't deafen him, but it would cause his reactive earplugs to block sound.

* * *

"The door area clear?"

"Think so." Kurt said, priming a long strip of explosive intended to bust the entire door open. "First time I knocked on the door, tracker picked up some kind of panic. I did the 'shave and a haircut' tune, and they seem to have relaxed a bit. We won't know until we do it, but there wasn't any movement close to the door anyway."

"Right." Chief held up three fingers, and Kurt nodded. He squeezed the trigger three times, then paused, then once more, which primed the detonator for three seconds and set it going. Both Spartans stood back.

* * *

"The area's clear. That's what I don't understand." Chris, one of Sesa's human troops, said as he swept the area with his shotgun. "And I don't mean there's nothing on the floor, I mean… this doesn't look like it's been running for months without maintenance."

"True." Thol said, walking over to a panel. After his success with the Forerunner communication outpost, he'd become something of a computer expert out of interest. "Hm. Last access was three days ago."

"What? But all the humans are in the front of the ship. And they couldn't have got through that door. Was there an access route we missed or something?"

"I have got a bad feeling about this…" an Unggoy said, looking around and fingering the grip of his pistol.

* * *

It was mainly luck that prevented a firefight. The moment the door blew, two blurs in green-metallic armour charged out with shotguns levelled – and stopped dead on seeing the four _other_ suits of MJOLNIR armour just outside the door.

"The hell?" One of them said, in a voice that sounded familiar to the Spartans.

"Alice, look." The other pointed. "A rabbit – it's Kelly!"

"Alice? Douglas? You're alive!" Linda said, delighted. "Where's Jerome?"

"He… didn't make it." Douglas replied, sadly. "Wait, what the hell is an Elite and a Jackal doing over there?"

"The war's over." John said, reassuringly.

Cortana elaborated. "The Sanghelli – the Elites – changed sides along with most of the Grunts, Hunters and Jackals, which are more properly called Unggoy, Lekgolo and Kig-yar. We're allies now. This is a retrieval mission."

The two Spartans of Red team looked at one another, then back to Blue team.

"We've got to get out of here – now!"

"Why?" John asked. "We sent a team to the engine room to shut off the engines, we're going to be able to salvage everything we can."

"No, you don't understand. This part of the ship – the part behind the sealed doors – is the only safe place."

A grizzled old Marine pushed past Red Team. "Your team's lost. The Flood will have got them."

Everyone in Blue team started in shock.

"Flood?" Cortana asked, as if in disbelief. "Captain! Most of the ship is infested with Flood! Noah contingency protocols in effect!"

From Blizzard's position just down the corridor, gunfire began.

* * *

Sesa kicked in his jetpack, lifting into the air, and a fusillade of fire from his paired plasma rifles ripped a combat form to shreds as it tried to jump down on him. "Cortana, the Flood appear resistant to plasma weaponry but it still works." Carbine shots flashed past him, doing very little to another Flood form. "Accuracy based weapons no use – these creatures have no vital organs."

Two Flood went down to a shotgun blast, and another exploded in a cloud of pink mist. "Shotgun type weapons both effective!" Chris called over the channel, and flinched as an infection form burst on his shields. "The little sods can't handle shields – we're in luck!"

"Stay focused. We only have so much ammunition."

A Marine nearly down as assault rifle fire from the upper floor overloaded his shields, and a carbine shot burst the infection form that tried to jump him.

"Thanks." The marine shouted, diving into a corner to wait for recharge.

Sesa switched to sword-and-dagger, and cleared the top balcony in a furiously balletic display of skill. "Fall back to the dropships! Orderly retreat!"

"This is the Captain. I'm sending in a relief force with more ammunition and heavier weapons. What do you advise?"

"The energy sword seems to shred them easiest, but anything that relies on mass tissue damage should work." Thol suggested, and fired his carbine again. This time, the chest of the infected human he hit seemed to 'burst', and it collapsed like a puppet with strings cut. "Thol here. There's a small Flood – an infector – inside each of the infected humans. Destroy it and it seems to become lifeless." He shot another infection form that tried to burrow inside the corpse. "They can replace one another, though."

"It appears their usual strategy is to pin their targets with the infested bodies, and then infest them. Likely they used all the dead bodies on Spirit of Fire as a starting force. But their tactic is less effective against shields."

"There's always something." Chris blew his target away with a shotgun blast, and saw it fall apart completely from the force. "Hey, someone wreck those bodies! We don't want them to have more to infect."

"We are unlikely to make it to the midships hanger before we get cut off, Captain." Sesa observed as the team finally broke out of the open space of the engine room, shotgun-armed soldiers on point and rearguard.

"Understood. The relief force headed for your position isn't going to enter the ship itself – instead, they'll pick you up."

Another Flood exploded in a blast of pink mist, but this time it had managed to get in close – a Marine's arm was broken, and he switched his now-unusable assault rifle for a plasma pistol. "Argh! Sunova…"

"How they pick us up?" A grunt asked curiously, firing a high-explosive pistol round at a Flood combat form and blowing the arm off.

"Everyone!" Sesa called, realizing the captain's plan. "Set shields to lockdown!"

* * *

"Bringing starboard lance to power. Dropships are in position."

"Take the shot, Chiron."

"Firing."

A bluish-white beam of ionized particles sliced into the Spirit of Fire, about fifty metres in front of the foremost transponder from Sesa's team. Air boiled out of the hole along with dozens of Flood combat forms, hundreds of Infection forms that exploded in the vacuum and nine soldiers in powered armour.

The pair of Pelican-IVs assigned to that section disgorged eight jetpack equipped Sanghelli Rangers, who each caught one of Sesa's troops and ferried them back to the Pelican before asphyxiation and depressurization could be fatal. Sesa himself made use of his customary jetpack to land in the bay of one of the Pelicans.

* * *

"Come on, hurry!" Sergeant Forge called, voice rasping. "Someone pull Serina, we've got to get out of here!"

Everyone who came through the door was carrying a shotgun or assault rifle, with as much spare ammunition as they could easily carry. They would have to protect the sides of the evacuation column themselves – Blizzard team with the addition of Kurt's plasma repeater were busy breaking trail for them.

"Alice, Douglas. Central reserve." John ordered. "Linda, shoot off any infectors that get too close. Kelly, you're with me, we're rearguard."

Kelly 'grinned', and cocked her needle shotgun. "First in, last out. Is the assault rifle good enough?"

"I've got other arrangements." John pulled the energy sword from his hip, checked the power levels, and lit it.

"Neat. That from Sesa?"

"Yes." John checked the _Spirit of Fire_'s bridge. "Anyone still in here?"

"Just me." The elderly Captain James Cutter walked up to him, a standard AI transfer chip in one hand and a shotgun in the other. "Lead the way, Spartan." As he got moving, he slipped Serina's chip into his personal communication unit to let her speak.

* * *

Needles shot down the corridor, burying themselves in Flood in neat trios before blowing them apart. The barrage lasted about a second, then stopped.

The rest of Blizzard team kept firing as Kath replaced his needle rifle cartridge. "I start to see what you mean – ammunition is becoming a problem." A Flood loomed out of the darkness to his side, and exploded in a blast of pellets as Kath dropped the rifle onto a sling mid-reload to fire his Mauler.

"Motion tracker's going crazy – how many Flood are there?"

"Full complement for _Spirit of Fire _was eleven thousand." An unfamiliar female voice said wearily. "I don't have exact figures on how many died off the ship, but there are probably thousands on board."

"Who is this?"

"Serina. I'm the AI for _Spirit_ – I was, anyway."

"Is there a faster way back to the second port docking bay? That's where our dropships are landed." Kurt asked, before cursing as his plasma repeater overheated with the sustained fire.

"Two corridors down, there's a large repair area for the bomber complement. It should still be pressurized, and it leads all the way to the docking bay. Turn right… now!"

Blizzard two skidded to a halt as the rest of the group made their turn, covering the corridor they'd turned off from, and threw a fire grenade to block the passage before reentering the flow of the column.

* * *

Plasma and heavy-calibre bullets pulsed from the chin guns of the two Pelican-IVs in the port boat bay, the torrent of heavy fire keeping the passage to their bay impassable for any of the Flood trying to gain entry.

"We really kicked the hornet's nest, command!" Lt. Natasha reported, reducing her fire rate as temperature readings climbed. "I don't know how the evacuees are going to make it into the bay, there's movement streaming along the lateral corridors towards us and they'll be buried in Flood!"

"I have a plan." Serina's tired voice cut in. "I'm leading them to the adjacent maintenance bay, and the divider's a single blast door – we should be able to get it open somehow."

"You got it, lady." Natasha said, and clicked onto the channel for her wingmate. "Hey, Firedrake? Ease up on the .50, we don't want to run out."

"My plasma's getting near overheat, Saker."

"Mine's still got some life – sequence fire. Cut your fire, I'll keep it on, and be ready to switch on my mark!"

"Understood."

* * *

Kurt charged through the door to the maintenance bay, and swore. "John! There's some kind of big Flood thing in here! Looks bigger than a Hunter and twice as tough!"

Blizzard team followed him, and spread out as the ponderous tank form began to lumber towards them. Empty munitions pallets crushed under its' weight, and a replacement cannon system for a Longsword went flying as it began picking up speed.

Half a dozen needles stitched through the air to hit it in centre of mass, and the combination explosion blew great chunks of biomass from its' torso. Three more blasted a leg apart, and it collapsed with a scream.

Kath gave a brief human-style victory gesture. "You like that?"

"Keep moving, soldier." Blizzard one ordered. "We don't know if there are more like it nearby. Keep a wide berth."

The monster twitched and writhed, its' body rapidly deforming as it shrunk to some other shape. Plasma grenades hit it in three places, finally killing it as their combined explosion filled the area with heat and gas.

"Door's shut – release mechanism's gone." Linda reported, having reached the door first, and swept her battle rifle to cover one of the two main entrances into the maintenance area.

"Yank me, Captain." Serina said, suddenly determined.

"Serina?"

"I said yank me. Put me in one of the fighters undergoing refit – I'll knock the door down with the autocannon."

"We might not have time to retrieve you – you've got to-"

"I'm not going to let everyone die here. And I _refuse_ to let my last act be a mistake to doom them all!" The AI practically snarled that last sentence, reminding everyone starkly that here was an AI around three times the Rampant age threshold.

Cutter wordlessly pulled the chip from his comm. link, and walked into the nearest Longsword. Hitting the nearby switch, he sealed the door. "If you end up staying, Serina, I'll stay with you. I'm too old anyway."

The fighter powered up, turned on roaring thrusters that almost drowned out the intensifying firefight, and blazed enormous 12cm shells into the main door at point blank range.

It was built to contain explosions, but never to endure that kind of continuous punishment. Within ten seconds the door buckled and tore off one hinge.

* * *

Natasha's Pelican jinked out of the way of the stream of rounds as it cut off. "That's quite some entrance. Firedrake, switch to the .50 and keep fire on the airlock – I'll load the first half of the escape group."

The second Pelican drifted into direct line with the door and unleashed the husbanded chaingun shells, physically tearing apart the Flood as they tried to enter.

* * *

The fighter's reactors cut out as the small bunker mass remaining exhausted itself, and the Longsword dropped two metres to hit the deck with a jarring clang. Cutter was knocked off his feet and hit the console, dazing him.

"Looks like this is the end, Captain." Serina said, as _Spirit of Fire_'s remaining crew crowded into the dropships. "It's been an honour."

"The honour's all mine, Serina."

The fighter's ramp exploded. Two green blurs ran into the cockpit at high speed, picked up both Cutter and the AI chip from the console, and ran back out as fast as their augmented legs could carry them.

"Spartan? What are you-?" Cutter asked, shaking his head to try to clear it.

"We don't leave anyone behind." The Master Chief said firmly.

"He's always been like this!" Kelly shouted to him over the chaingun roar. "Ever since basic!"

The Pelicans were already turning, their passengers firing from the cargo bay to keep the Flood suppressed, as two Spartans leapt up into the hovering dropships and two more caught each one.

"You never change, do you John?" Alice asked over the private Spartan channel, shaking her head.

The doors closed, sealing the Pelicans.

"Brace yourselves, this is going to be bumpy!" Lt. Natasha, callsign Saker, advised her passengers.

And shot the shield door generator.

Both ships gunned their impulse drives past maximum safe settings and rocketed out into space with the atmosphere, hundreds of decompressing Flood following them and being burned out of the continuum by _Sagittarius_' pulse laser batteries.

* * *

After a few crowded seconds, Captain Cutter extracted himself from the crush of celebrating troops and naval personnel in the hold and made his way up to the cockpit.

For a moment, he just stared at the human- no, _Alliance_ battlecruiser floating pristine in space, shields shimmering slightly where debris hit them.

"It's... astonishing. I don't think I'd really believed what the Spartans said until now… the war's over." He tried the sentence out in his mouth.

Natasha looked the legendary old officer over. "Well, not quite over, sir. But the Covenant's broken and we're more-or-less out of the hardest part."

She checked her eyepiece. "Sir, you might want to look out the starboard window."

Cutter complied, and beheld _Spirit of Fire_ hanging in space. Great wounds studded her surface, and two openings on the port side streamed air.

But _Spirit_ had been his command for so long, he saw the beauty in her still.

The window went dark as Natasha polarized it, then flashed with obscured brilliance as _Sagittarius_ put two energy lances and a super-MAC round through the active reactor complex.

Cutter bowed his head. "Thank you, for giving me one last look at her. I know she had to go, but…" He blinked, and shook his head. "Better this way."

* * *

"Sesa?"

The Ultra turned, seeing the Master Chief walking over to him.

"What is it?"

"I just wanted to say… thanks." Chief held up the energy sword Sesa had bestowed upon him. "This saved my life in there."

"No thanks are needed. You have brought it great honour by using it to shield others from the Parasite."

* * *

"All this is very discouraging." Cutter said, looking around _Sagittarius'_ bridge. "It's neat, efficient, much higher tech than I'm used to, and it means I'm not going to be much use anymore."

"I'm sure nobody could ask more than you've already given." Maclean assured him. "Besides, the UNSC's going to have a chance to shift back to a peace footing soon – or at least less of a war one." The younger captain gave his senior a sly look. "Tell you what, tomorrow I'll take you to a good restaurant and we'll exchange war stories. I bet you've got some good ones, and it'll give you a chance to get practiced for the press conferences which are going to be inevitable. In fact, you could invite your wife along."

"Sorry?" Cutter asked, confused. "I thought you were taking me out tomorrow. My wife's not on board, is she?"

Maclean shared the confusion for a moment, before he got it. "Oh, I see. No, we'll be back on Earth tomorrow afternoon. We got the Slipspace drives from the Covenant, as well. Chiron?"

"Tomorrow afternoon is a vile condemnation of my navigational talents. We should be there in about five hours – Covenant-style slipstream space drives are capable of a travel rate around three hundred and thirty thousand times the speed of light."

Cutter stood, shocked. More than anything else, that casual reference to an _insane_ travel speed underscored how much things had changed while he was gone.

* * *

"Really?" Alice asked.

"Yeah. Everyone has shields now – you might have seen shield scatter from Blizzard team's marines? Anyway, the Sanghelli brought the technology, and we humans tweaked it, and there we were. Shields as common as Kevlar inserts used to be. Ours are much denser now, too – same kind of thing as a Zealot." Kelly explained to the two returned Spartans. "And we've got internal medical gel, as well, which solves one of the major problems of Mjolnir-V armour."

Linda and Kurt hefted a crate over to the trio, and opened the top. "Here. This is a basic training load of all the weapons that got developed since 2531. You've got a lot of catching up to do. Now, this is the current model of battle rifle – note the plasma overcharger…"

* * *

"What's wrong, John?" Cortana asked privately. The Chief was staring at his new plasma sword, sitting in his quarters with his helmet off.

"I suppose it's… Jerome. I though I was over them – their deaths, I mean. I'd accepted them as normal, mourned them, and kept going – because you have to keep going in war. But then there was this, and I found out two of them lived."

"And you feel angry at them that Jerome died and they didn't." Cortana said. "And then you feel guilty at being angry."

"Yeah."

"That's the wrong way to look at it, though." The AI advised. "I'm a copy of Dr. Elizabeth Halsey, remember, and she cares for all of you – like I do, for all of you. And I can tell you that rather than Jerome dying, you need to think of it like this. _Alice and Douglas came back from the dead._ They really were 'just MIA'. Hardly anyone has that happen to them." Cortana clapped her hands, which didn't produce noise directly but she played the appropriate sound for it. "Now, come on. The others are showing off all the new toys they got over the last couple of decades. You're going to want to be there when Kelly starts insulting your assault rifle like always."

"Okay, fine." John stood up, replaced his helmet, and walked out of his quarters to the firing range.

He had a couple of childhood friends to catch up with.

* * *

AN: Well, that was interesting. Almost half this chapter got written in one go - suppose I must have hit inspiration.

As you can see, the Alliance is almost completely racially integrated by now.

I don't think there's ever been officially stated what Shortsword bombers hold, so I just went for larger (or smaller) versions of modern heavy bombs.


End file.
